• 1-1 in Romania. Narration and statistics

Sometimes, in football, nothing happens. It is unlikely. Almost a miracle. I no longer speak of goals, small leather utopias, but of a fragile danger, some oops, some scandalous fault, tiny fires in the stands ... anything other than the emerald and endless film of the lawn, or the very soft and sterile magreo of the ball in the center of the field. The first time of Cluj-Sevilla at the Dr. Constantin Rdulescu Stadium was an existentialist gymnastics. Nothing. And then more nothing. A handful of corners candidly held by the stands. An unintentional, casual, relentless auction of De Jong that touched the crossbar. And nothing else that deserves to occupy space on this paper, or on this screen, according to the reader's taste.

If Lopetegui had a plan, he tried to hide it. You can blame the stone, the grass did not encourage magic, but more palpable than the bald field was the lack of tension of Sevilla. Official and languid. No ideas up and unplugged back. The bump starts to look like a well. The Cluj de Petrescu plays practical and ugly. It was enough to bother an absent, ghostly Seville. Europe was going to be the redemption of a fainted team, but the block showed the same shortcomings as in the League. Romo, apathetic and brittle.

Ciprian Deac was fluttering on the sides of the Nerves while Omrani and Traoré struggled with the centrals. Balls to the pot and let the clock fall heavily on the visitor consciousness. Jordán, Fernando and Gudelj were, in the core, mere spectators of a circus died. Above, De Jong dropping balls for anyone. Like who picks orange blossom from orange to let it wilt on the ground. No reaction, no pulse, only sad horizontal movements. No art to move the tail gown and tear off by joys if the party demands it. Just gray brushstrokes. Only the newcomer Suso brought a fine and pale hope.

Koundé Clumsiness

The second half began and nothing changed. The railway team saw that Sevilla still did not appear and took a step forward. The harassment had a prize. A side center, running the 59th minute, served to make Koundé penalize; raising arms awkwardly, hitting the ball, calling misfortune. Deac did not fail, who threw satin to the left of Vaclik. The Czech goalkeeper guessed the trajectory, but he lacked flight.

It took Seville a century to shake off the sadness. Rony Lopes and En-Nesyri entered, replacing Ocampos and an unrecognizable Jesus Navas. With them in the field the team recovered some spans of land. After a few minutes of shaking off laziness, the Andalusian team braided a play of value. Rony Lopes leaked a quality pass to De Jong, who controlled and gave in to En-Nesyri, who only had to push the ball to goal. And Lopes still had, in the extension, a distant shot that Arlauskis stopped visibly. Perhaps, the only good news of the night, the good minutes of the Portuguese, unpublished in this zigzagging season.

Seen the match, the tie was celebrated with sincere enthusiasm. The return in the Ramón Sánchez-Pizjuán will improve this match, because worsening it seems like an impossible, almost melancholic exercise.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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