Espanyol

The lesser known team from Barcelona, they are often overshadowed by their city rivals. However, they have been in the top flight of Spanish football for a while now. This season looked like it was going to start well with a new 45,000 seater stadium. However, during a pre-season friendly tour in Italy, club captain Daniel Jarque died of a heart attack. The sense of shock was deep prior to the season kicking off and it will be interesting to see how the club gets back on it's feet after losing such an influential member of the team in such a tragic way.

They are currently in a mid table position and will hope to qualify for Europe next season. They won the Copa del Rey in 2006 and qualified for the Uefa Cup in 2006.07 and managed to reach the final in Scotland. After an entertaining 2-2 draw they lost 3-1 on penalties to La Liga rivals Sevilla.

They have some decent players including their entertaining goalkeeper Carlos Kameni, midfielder Ivan de la Pena and forward Luis Garcia. Having been knocked out of the they can concentrate on the league.