Monday, September 19, 2011

10-man Real Madrid beaten by spirited Levante

Real Madrid surprisingly crashed 1-0 at Levante on Sunday, with midfielder Sami Khedira being harshly sent off after 40 minutes.

Ivory Coast striker Arouna Kone hit the shock winner for Levante 22 minutes from time.

Cristiano Ronaldo, who started the game on the subs' bench, came close to equalizing three times towards the end, but the ageing Levante defence managed to hold out for a memorable win.

Real have not scored in their last three visits to Levante's Ciutat de Valencia stadium.

The surprise defeat leaves the whites in joint fourth place with six points. They are two points behind Sevilla and Barcelona, and three behind runaway leaders Valencia.

Real coach Jose Mourinho decided to leave Ronaldo on the bench because of a heavy blow to the ankle in Wednesday's Champions League win in Zagreb. In his place was Kaka, who turned in his umpteenth sluggish, disjointed display.

Levante are the oldest team in La Liga, with eight players in their starting line-up over 30. They defended solidly from start to finish, and goalkeeper Gustavo Munua had surprisingly little work to do.

In the 40th minute Khedira, who already had a yellow card, naively scuffled with Sergio Ballesteros, Levante's 36 year-old captian. Khedira earned himself a second yellow - and suddenly Real were in big trouble.

The only goal came in the 68th minute. Right-back Javi Venta, another of Levante's veterans, broke free down the right and centred for Kone, who scored with a close-range blast.

Real left the field complaining, not only about the sending-off of Khedira, but also about not getting a penalty for handball by Levante's Vicente Iborra.

Earlier on Sunday, Atletico Madrid had scored their first win by thrashing Racing Santander, with newcomer Radamel Falcao banging in a hat-trick.

The Colombian striker - who also scored in Thursday's Europa League defeat of Celtic - is set fair to become the new Atletico idol, after the departure of Diego Forlan and Sergio Aguero.

Another of Sunday's goal-scoring heroes was Luis Garcia, who hit both goals in Zaragoza's 2-1 home defeat of Espanyol, his former club.

In Sunday's lunchtime match, Rayo Vallecano beat south Madrid neighbours Getafe 1-0 away, thanks to an early goal from Michu.

Sunday's late game was scheduled to bring together Athletic Bilbao, who have just one point, and surprise package Betis, who won their first two matches.

No comments:

Post a Comment