Spanish League Round Up Week 13

Spanish League Round Up Week 13

Last weekend’s games saw another defeat for Real Madrid, Espanyol lose and lose their manager and both Malaga and Atletico Madrid hit four goals

Real Madrid crashed to their third defeat of the season when Betis beat them 1-0 in Seville, whilst Atletico – who visit the Bernabeu next week - put four past Seville on Sunday, something Malaga also managed to do against Valencia the night before. At the other end, Espanyol’s 0-2 defeat to Getafe led to Pochettino being shown the door on Monday, whilst Osasuna’s point in Donosti still leaves them second bottom, a point behind Granada and Deportivo.

Beñat sinks Madrid

Betis midfielder Beñat scored a great goal from the edge of the box in the first half to sink Real Madrid on Saturday. In the second half Madrid laid siege to the Betis goal, but were unable to equalise and went down to their third defeat of the season leaving them 11 points behind Barça. Atletico Madrid now have an eight point lead on their neighbours ahead of next week’s derby game, following their impressive 4-0 win over Seville. The visitors had Faziel sent off after 20 minutes, when he gave away the penalty Falcao put away for the first goal and when they were already 3-0 down with 10 minutes left to play, Michel’s team were reduced to nine, when Ratikic saw his second yellow.

Malaga put four past Valencia

After four league games without a win, Malaga bounced back with a four goal thumping of fellow Champions League side Valencia, who are still without a win on the road and now have the worst away record of La Liga. Portillo opened the scoring early on, whilst Saviola, Santa Cruz and Isco finished off the game in the second half, when Valencia also had Rami sent off. Malaga are now fourth, level on points with Betis and four behind Madrid, whislt Valencia are stuck in mid-table – eleventh on 18 points. After the defeat, Valencia’s Brazilian striker Jonas admitted: “if we carry on like this, we won’t be in the fight for anything. If we don’t get into the Champions League next year, it’ll be a disaster for the club”.

Pochettino pays the price

Espanyol slumped to their eighth defeat of the season on Saturday, when Getafe won 0-2 at El Prat and on Monday the club announced that Mauricio Pochettino had been relieved of his duties as coach. Whoever the new boss is, he’ll face an uphill task, with Espanyol having won just twice so far this season and sitting a point behind Osasuna – who drew on Friday in Donosto – and two points off Granada, Deportivo, and safety. Granada went down 1-0 to Valladolid, whilst Deportivo took a point from San Mames with a 1-1 draw against Athletic Bilbao. Celta took their first points on the road with a 0-1 win at Zaragoza on Monday night and lifted themselves up to 14 points - one ahead of Mallorca who went down 2-1 at Rayo - their ninth game on the run without a win.

 

Força Barça
Força Barça

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