Villarreal open their La Liga campaign against Deportivo La Coruña with the sides separated by just 0.45 in Formatic's weighted recent form measure, the visitors edging it at 5.78 out of 10 against the hosts' 5.33. Both ratings sit in the steady band, neither side arriving with momentum sharp enough to dominate the fixture on paper, and the pre-season evidence offers little to split them. Villarreal have won 2 and lost 3 across their last five outings, scoring 10 and conceding 9, while Deportivo have taken 3 wins and a draw from five, scoring 9 and shipping only 3. The goals column tilts firmly toward the visitors, who have kept 3 clean sheets in that sample and conceded across just two fixtures, both friendlies.

Villarreal's competitive form before the summer break was erratic. A 5-1 home win over Atletico Madrid on 24 May showed their ceiling, but losses either side of it, 2-3 at home to Sevilla and 0-2 away to Rayo Vallecano, exposed inconsistency at both ends. They have scored in 3 of their last 5 but have not kept a clean sheet in any, conceding in every match itemised. Pre-season brought a 3-1 win at PSV Eindhoven and a 0-2 loss at Benfica, both friendlies and both carrying limited weight, but the defensive fragility persists as a thread through the sample. The hosts have found the net regularly, 10 goals across five matches, yet the 9 conceded in the same span underlines the open shape of their recent fixtures.

Deportivo's recent run is tighter. Their competitive tail carried a 2-1 home win over FC Andorra, a 2-0 away victory at Valladolid and a 1-2 home loss to Las Palmas, all in Segunda División, before friendlies against Compostela, won 4-0, and Oviedo, a 0-0 draw. The defensive solidity stands out: 3 goals conceded in 5 matches and 3 clean sheets in the same period, with scoring in 4 of the 5. The Oviedo blank was their only failure to find the net, and even accounting for the friendly context, the balance between attack and defence reads more stable than Villarreal's profile. That 4-0 win at Compostela, again a friendly, inflates the goals tally slightly, but the competitive fixtures show a side capable of controlling games without leaking.

The head to head across the last 10 meetings gives Villarreal 4 wins to Deportivo's 2, with 4 draws, and an average of 2.0 goals per fixture. Both teams scored in 4 of those 10, and only 3 went over 2.5 goals, pointing to a historically tight series. The five most recent clashes include three draws, all goalless or 1-1, and Villarreal's 4-2 win at Deportivo on 12 May 2018, a rare high-scoring outlier. Deportivo's most recent win in the sample came at Villarreal on 8 May 2016, finishing 0-2, and three of the five itemised meetings ended without a goal for one side or both.

Villarreal's status as top-flight regulars meets Deportivo's tighter recent numbers and defensive discipline in a fixture where neither side has carried dominant form into the new season. The head to head leans marginally toward the hosts by wins but trends low-scoring, and the current shape of both teams suggests goals may be harder to come by than Villarreal's pre-season tally implies. The defensive frailty in the hosts' sample and the visitors' clean-sheet habit across the same period point to a contest decided by which side handles pressure in the final third, with value likely to sit closer to conservative totals than the headline attacking numbers suggest.