Real Madrid vs. Málaga 2015: Final score 3-1, Madrid fend off Malaga challenge

The first hour of the match was full, with Real Madrid rarely kicking in to high gear and Malaga struggling to create much danger. The last half hour was well worth the price of admission, though, and saw some scintillating football as Real Madrid held off a strong challenge from their opponents and wound up with a 3-1 win.

That injury seemed to take the wind out of Real’s sails a bit, as they didn’t appear to want to push too hard and risk more injuries if they could avoid it. They mostly looked content to knock the ball around and wait for Malaga to make a mistake, and Malaga’s desperation to win the ball back saw them give up numerous fouls for Real to try free kicks with.

One of those came off well for Madrid, when Sergio Ramos read Malaga’s try at an offside trap on a Cristiano Ronaldo free kick perfectly and beat it, checking his run and then surging forward to get on the end of the ball in from Ronaldo and fire past a helpless Carlos Kameni. Malaga claimed Ramos was offside and on replays it looked awfully close, but the referees allowed the goal and Madrid had a 1-0 lead after 24 minutes.

Ramos wasn’t as lucky about ten minutes later when he headed another Ronaldo free kick in, but was one of six Real Madrid players offside on that try. That was the best chance Real had left in the half, and Malaga couldn’t muster up much of an attack themselves, getting more shots off, but struggling to get them on target or get in to dangerous positions before shooting.

Real rarely popped out of first gear for much of the second half, content to just sit on their lead and try to close the door on Malaga’s attack. It looked for awhile that would be that for the match -- then we were subjected to a crazy five minutes of football.

It started with Real Madrid making their first real, concerted attack of the half, a move that ended with James Rodriguez getting hacked down in the box. Everyone assumed that would be 2-0 and essentially the end of the match with Cristiano Ronaldo standing over the ball to score his 301st Real Madrid goal, but fate had other ideas as his shot banged off the post and clear away.

James wasn’t satisfied to leave a goal on the table, playing a series of one-twos with Javier Hernandez and Ronaldo before unleashing a wicked strike that found the top corner of the goal to put Real up 2-0. It was a jaw-dropping sequence and goal, but it wasn’t the end of that crazy spell of play. Malage pushed hard right after the restart, and it paid off when Juanmi caught Real’s defense napping, getting on the end of a ball from Roberto Rosales and heading the ball home to close the gap back to one goal.

Things were more open-ended after that, but Malaga couldn’t find a second goal despite some pretty desperate efforts breaking forward. Instead, it was Madrid striking on the counter, with Hernandez poking a throughball for Ronaldo to tap in to an empty net to make it 3-1 in injury time. Ronaldo nearly had a brace at the final whistle, but couldn’t get the ball on the right side of the post and blasted in to the side netting.

It was a well deserved win for Real, and a much-needed one after Barcelona won earlier in the day. The result doesn’t change much for Malaga, sitting in a seventh place position with plenty of points above and below, but Madrid needed the win to keep pace in La Liga, and this also served as a good tune-up for their efforts to try and break their Champions League quarterfinal deadlock with rival Atletico Madrid midweek.

Goals: Ramos (24’), Rodriguez (69’), Ronaldo (90’+1)

Goals: Juanmi (71’)