From 5 pm onwards the Benito Villamarín Stadium has been baring witness to the last training session for Gabriel Humberto Calderón's team prior to RCD Espanyol's visit tomorrow, again at 5 pm. This will be the Argentine's debut in the Betis coliseum as manager. The match, just as the other 17 matches remaining until the end of the competition, are vital to Betis' interests who have the minutest margin of error if they wish to continue dreaming about salvation in the First Division. The Captain of the Betis ship remains hopeful of being able to turn the situation around soon, a point of discussion that will continue if the team wins tomorrow: "I do not base my work on calculations, mathematically we can do it but we desperately need to win a match. The team knows they are indebted to the supporters. We cannot be thinking about points only about winning the next match. Calculations are bad. In football you are never lost, except when you think you cannot win. I have never done that and I am not going to start now".

For this reason the team, who have taken up the gauntlet thrown down by the manager, know that tomorrow they have to give their all and "put their lives on the line", proclaimed Calderón. Throughout the week he has been centring on the correction of individual errors that led to defeat in Vigo. This afternoon the team, focussed on the visit by the team called the 'parakeets', they have shown the character they aim to have on the field of play.

In terms of those in doubt for selection mainly they centre on Leo Baptistao, who only started training with the rest of the group yesterday for the first time this week because of discomfort in his right quadriceps. The Brazilian forward, who in the words of Calderón "is not 100% fit", has completed a full training session this afternoon, but whatever the case we will have to wait for official communication of the squad to be announced after training.

Meanwhile, the last signing in the winter transfer market, Alfred N'Diaye, has trained under Calderón's orders, from which we can deduce that if the Argentine manager deems fit he could get his first match minutes in tomorrow's match. The same is true of Antonio Adán, who could also debut against RCD Espanyol if Calderón decides to give him a starter position. The only one who will not be selected is Nono, who is sidelined for the match against Aguirre's squad because of card accumulation. The centre half from Cadiz will join Perquis, who was absent fro training this afternoon so he will miss tomorrow's league match.