La Liga Matchday One, Saturday Recap: Valencia Scores Twice in Final Minutes to Win 4-3

0-1 Agirretxe Min. 34

0-2 Agirretxe Min 65

1-2 De Las Cuevas (penalty) Min. 68

Real Sociedad went in to Gijón and pulled out a well-deserved victory with two goals from Agirretxe. The donostiarras controlled the game from the first whistle with an organized, balanced possession-based attack, and showed off some of their impressive young talent, as both Íñigo Martínez and Illarramendi delivered poised, veteran performances. Shockingly, the match was essentially devoid of major refereeing mistakes, despite the fact that referee Paradas Romero showed two red cards and awarded a penalty to Sporting (normally in Spain, and I guess in soccer generally, such occurrences are followed by rioting). While Real Sociedad dominated most of the match, Sporting made a push towards the end of the second half after Rivera came in for Sergio Álvarez in the deep-lying playmaker role. Rivera’s presence inspired Sporting to push to try to equalize, and while they came up short, they can at least be happy that they weren’t completely annihilated. Yay?

1-0 Soldad Min. 1

1-1 Soldado (own goal) Min. 7

1-2 Acosta Min. 14

1-3 Adrián Min. 56

2-3 Rami Min. 58

3-3 Soldado Min. 88

4-3 Soldado Min. 90

Well, isn’t that a heck of a scoreline? Can you imagine Roberto Soldado’s emotions during that game? First minute, “yay! I scored!” Five minutes later, “oh sh*t, own goal. I suck.” Last minute: “well, we’re gonna lose because of me—wait! I scored again!” Two minutes later: “Wooo! I’m the best! I scored again!” (Thank you, thank you, that dramatic interpretation brought to you by a generous grant from no one, and from viewers like you). Seriously, though, this game could literally not have been more entertaining to watch. It had everything that we like about mid-table Spanish soccer: exciting passing and finishing, shaky defending, incredibly runs, and even more incredibl(y bad) defending. Roberto Soldado went from goat to glory in two breathtaking minutes, and Valencia fans will surely forget the fact that their team was getting handily beaten by an inferior Racing side for most of the 90 minutes. Racing will hang their hats on the fact that they went into Mestalla and outplayed Valencia for much of the match; oh, and they’ll also have to thank their keeper Toño for letting them stay in the match at all—that guy is a super-athletic save machine.

Unfortunately, Sergio Canales didn’t make a splash in his debut for los Ché, probably because he was told that he’d have to room with Éver Banega if he messed up. OK fine, that’s not true. But it would be an awesome punishment or hazing ritual.

0-1 Rubén Castro Min. 87

The first (and arguably less interesting) of two inter-Andalucía derbies ended 0-1 to Betis, as Rubén Castro netted the winner in the 87th minute. The main highlight? 16 year-old Vadillo made his debut for Betis and played a phenomenal first half; he was subsequently dropped by a really rough tackle at the beginning of the second half and had to be immediately replaced. The game looked to be heading to a rather exciting 0-0 draw (there were various shots off the post—including one that was infinitesimally close to being our second own goal of the evening—and at least one missed penalty), when Rubén Castro collected a ball in Sporting’s area and slotted it by Roberto to pick up the three points for Betis. The match could have come to blows numerous times (we all know how intense these Andalusian derbies between Betis and Sporting are. Wait, no we don’t), but referee Pérez Lasa, despite missing an obvious penalty committed by Sporting’s Lucena on Betis’ Sevilla, managed to keep the players cool just long enough to get them all off the pitch. And that’s really all we can ask for in these feisty just-came-up-from-second-division derbies.