Heat is on in Spain

With the Spanish league only one game old, the pressure of the summer spending spree is starting to show at several clubs, and Real Madrid and Valencia have already suffered high- profile clashes between chairmen and coaches.

The Valencia chairman, Paco Roig, has had to play down his differences with his manager, Luis Aragones, after a television station disclosed the two had engaged in a heated argument argument at the airport on the way to their game at Racing Santander.

Aragones allegedly accused his employer of buying new players only when he had received money from transferring players out of the club.

The criticism seemed unjustified when one of those signings, Brazil's World Cup star Romario, helped Valencia to a 2-0 lead, but then his side let in an own goal, had their goalkeeper Andoni Zubizarreta sent off and lost 3-2.

Real Madrid's game at Deportivo La Coruna was also played under the shadow of remarks made by their new coach, Fabio Capello. After spending more than pounds 20m renovating the squad, Capello - previously with Milan - complained that he still needed midfielders.

The Italian was asked to explain his comments by the club's chairman, Lorenzo Sanz, who concluded Capello's Spanish had been misunderstood.

Bobby Robson's improvised Spanish is coming on well. Helped by bits of Portuguese from his time at Oporto, the new Barcelona coach was able to tell reporters that he had been annoyed with his players before Hristo Stoichkov set them on the way to a somewhat fortunate 4-2 victory at Oviedo.