In his time in charge, Orti managed to resist pressure from Real to sell Gaizka Mendieta and Roberto Ayala, among several Los Che stars, and on Villa's case he said: "The pay at Madrid is of a scale that is more than triple what they receive here.

"For Real, it is very easy to go for a player from Valencia; the other way around is very complicated because we cannot pay those amounts.

"We took three from them for nothing and (current president) Juan Soler would do well to demand four players during talks on the subject of Villa. The player will have a big say in this."