Levante vs Rayo Vallecano preview - Must-win game - Viera

Rayo Vallecano striker Jonathan Viera feels his team must beat Levante on Saturday if they are to stay in the fight to avoid relegation.

Paco Jemez's side are five points from safety but last weekend slipped three points behind Real Valladolid, who occupy the final relegation spot.

"We knew that many of our rivals would win last week and the reality is that now we have to go to Levante with our knuckles sharpened because this game is vital for us," Viera told a press conference.

"We cannot be fooled. If we want to be there in the middle of the fight we have to win, because if we don't, the other teams will get away from us and it will be very difficult."

Along with bottom-side Betis, Rayo have the worst defensive record in the league and Viera admitted they have become their own worst enemy, gifting the opposition goals, such as David Villa's opener for Atletico last weekend, which was facilitated by Raul Baena giving the ball away on the edge of his own area.

"Other teams don't have to do very much to score against us, and we have to change that because if not, things will become very difficult for us," he said.

"It's as if everything has gone black for us, every time the ball goes into our area it ends up in the net, and that doesn't happen to our rivals."

They face a Levante side who conceded five goals to Barcelona in mid-week but pulled off a remarkable 3-2 win at Sevilla in their last league outing, becoming the first team to beat Unai Emery's side since November 2.

The win lifted Joaquin Caparros' men up to eighth in the league and midfielder Pedro Lopez believes they are in an ideal position to achieve their primary objective of avoiding relegation, but is determined to take a step closer to that goal by beating Rayo.

Lopez said: "Being honest, if we look at the league table we see that we are the leaders of our mini-league [of teams aiming to avoid relegation].

"We need to keep this level up, try and get good results and try to guarantee survival as soon as possible so we avoid trouble.

"If we beat Rayo we'll get up to 30 points, which is a lot in this evenly-matched league. We want to beat Rayo so we keep picking up points and that's how we'll get closer to our objective, which is avoiding relegation."

Nikos Karabelas is suspended for the game after getting sent off at Sevilla, while Baba Diawara returns to the side, banned from facing Sevilla for contractual reasons.

Rayo have no fresh injury concerns.