RCD Mallorca will host Villarreal CF on Sunday at Son Moix in jornada 35 of LaLiga EA Sports, a 14.00 hours kickoff that puts very different pressures on both sides. Mallorca need a result that keeps their survival fight alive, while Villarreal arrive already qualified for next season’s UEFA Champions League and still chasing second place.
For Mallorca, the math is clear. A victory would lift them to 41 points, a figure that would bring them closer to the safety target the club is trying to reach. They come in with 10 of the last 15 points available, and they have built much of that push at home, where they have won four and drawn one of their last five matches. Their last outing also gave them a lift, a 0-1 win at Girona. But the memory of this matchup is less comfortable: Mallorca have lost their last two home matches against Villarreal.
Villarreal, meanwhile, travel with the season already carrying a different kind of weight. The place in the Champions League is secured, but the team still wants to finish runner-up in the league and would need to trim a nine-point gap to Real Madrid to do it. The form away from home leaves room for doubt. Villarreal have won only one of their last five away matches, even if they enter after a 5-1 victory over Levante in the previous round. They have also won their last two visits to Son Moix.
The absences could matter on both benches. Mallorca will be without the suspended Pablo Maffeo and the injured Mateo Joseph and Antonio Raíllo, though Samu Costa and Vedat Muriqi are available. Villarreal will be missing the injured Juan Foyth. Those gaps add another layer to a match where the points mean far more to one side than the other.
The same matchday also carries weight elsewhere in the table. Athletic Club and Valencia CF meet at San Mamés, with Valencia still near the relegation zone and needing points of their own, while Getafe CF visit Real Oviedo, a game that could see Oviedo’s relegation consumed this same weekend. In that wider picture, Mallorca’s task is simpler and harsher than everyone else’s: take the points now, or keep looking over their shoulder.
