Heavy victory of “Barcelona” and “Atletico” in third place

Barcelona, ​​fighting for the championship in Spain with Real Madrid, won a tough home win over Athletic on Tuesday. The Basques have recently established themselves as an extremely uncomfortable rival for the Catalans. Blue garnet did not beat the team from Bilbao for more than two years or in four meetings in a row in all tournaments. Moreover, the last two matches ended in the defeat of Barca with a minimum score.

In the reporting match, the wards of Enrique Setena were again close to misfiring, but still achieved a difficult victory. And three points to the hosts unexpectedly brought Ivan Rakitich, not scoring since March last year. Then he managed to chalk up the only ball in a derby with Real Madrid.

This time, the Croat also marked an extremely important goal. Going for a substitution in the middle of the second half, the midfielder burst into the penalty area in the 71st minute, received a pass from Lionel Messi and just shot into the far corner. The Argentinean himself gave the 15th goal pass in the current season, Examples and the 250th - in all games in the “Barcelona”.

Meanwhile, Atlético took advantage of the misfire of Seville in the match against Villarreal and beat the opponent in the fight for third place. Wards Diego Simeone with a minimum score on the road beat Levante and won a third victory in a row.

The fate of the confrontation was decided by an own goal of the home team defender Bruno Gonzalez in the 15th minute. The footballer cut the ball into his own goal, trying to interrupt the backache on Diego Costa after playing the standard position.

Levante players could not answer the goal of Madrid, although they delivered 12 shots. However, not one of them was on target at Jan Cloud. Thus, the Slovenian spent the third consecutive match to “zero” in Example and extended the “dry” series in the championship of Spain to 323 minutes. 

Another team fighting for a ticket to the Champions League - Getafe - again lost points. The Pepe Bordalas team has not known victories in the national championship since March 1 or during five meetings. After the resumption of the season, the rival of Krasnodar in the Europa League did not score points in matches with Granada (1: 2), Espanyol (0: 0) and Eibar (1: 1).

On Tuesday, Getafe away did not manage to beat Valladolid, which is on the 15th place, 1-1. Opponents exchanged goals scored at the end of the first half. In the 41st minute, the attacking guests Jaime Mata opened the score with an unexpected shot into the near corner. For him, this goal was the ninth in the Example. But the hosts in the time added by the referee earned a penalty, which was realized by Enes Unal. A draw left Getafe on the fifth line. The lagging behind the fourth “Seville” is four points.

Reflected by Schmeichel penalty and the first goal of Kane in the year 

In England, Lester faced third problems in the Premier League standings. On Saturday, Brendan Rogers wards did not manage to beat the outsider Watford (1: 1), and on Tuesday at home they broke the world with Brighton fighting for survival - 0: 0. As a result, Chelsea got the opportunity, in case of victory over Manchester City on Thursday, to reduce the gap from the opponent to one point.

And closer to the victory were exactly the guests who at the beginning of the meeting did not realize the penalty, appointed for a foul of the young defender of the hosts James Justin on Aaronn Connolly. However, Neil Mope, who brought Brighton a sensational victory over Arsenal a few days ago, failed to outplay Casper Schmeichel from the penalty spot.

Now Dane has 22 reflected penalties, six of which are in the Premier League. In the current season of the Premier League, the goalkeeper also fended off Sergio Aguero’s shot from the “point” in the match with Manchester City, but Leicester was defeated with a minimum score.

In another meeting of the day's play, Tottenham turned out to be stronger than West Ham - 2-0 and interrupted the four-match losing streak in the Premier League. The Londoners won their first victory on February 16th.

The first half ended without goals scored. At the same time, the judge canceled the goal of Song Heung Min due to a microscopic offside. But after a break, Jose Mourinho's team was helped by the midfielder of the opponent Tomas Soucek. After filing a corner Czech heel ferried the ball into his own goal. And in the end of the match, Harry Kane managed to excel. The striker, who recently returned to duty after a serious injury, marked his first goal in 2020.

The incredible mistake of Verona and the first victory of Cagliari in 2020 

Napoli, which won the Italian Cup last week, successfully played their first match after resuming the season in Serie A. The Neapolitans beat Verona 2-0 away and won their fourth consecutive championship victory.

Guests scored both goals after a corner. In the middle of the first half, the score was opened by Arkadiusz Milik. And in the 90th minute, Irwin Lozano, who replaced shortly before, scored.

In turn, Verona failed to break through David Ospin, although it struck 11 shots at his goal. For example, in the first half, with an equal score, Valerio Verre with his head from a meter miraculously failed to redirect the ball into the net after a shooting lane of a partner.

Meanwhile, Parma striker Andreas Cornelius became the author of an unusual achievement. For the second time this season, the Dane scored a hat-trick in the match against Genoa. In both meetings, his team achieved devastating victories: 5: 1 in October and 4: 1 in June.

On Tuesday, Cornelius scored for every taste: with a careful blow from several meters, a shot between the legs of the goalkeeper from an acute angle and a beautiful nod of the head.

“Genoa” in the first half, when the score was 1-0 in favor of “Parma” did not realize a penalty. Former Zenit defender Domenico Crisito from the penalty spot could not beat Luigi Cepe. But after the break, the judge awarded another penalty in favor of the Genoese, and this time Iago Falke was accurate.

Another notable event on the day of the Italian Championship was the end of the long win-win series Cagliari, which lasted from December 2. The team of Walter Dzengi could not win the national championship for 12 matches.

The series ended in an away match with an outsider SPAL. Three points to guests in the 93rd minute brought Giovanni Simeone. The son of the head coach of “Atletico” closed backache João Pedro from close range and scored the eighth goal this season. And the Brazilian scored 19th point in the “goal + pass” system (16 + 3) in Serie A and climbed to fifth place in the number of points for performance.

Victories awaited in Torino. Turinians with a minimum score at home defeated Udinese thanks to the tenth goal of Andrea Belotti and achieved the first win in eight matches.

Sensation in Lisbon and the defeat in Porto 

In the Portuguese championship, the extremely unpredictable fight for gold continues between Porto and Benfica. In almost every round, rivals give gifts to each other, misfiring in matches with teams inferior in class. On Tuesday, the Lisbon at home in a dramatic match lost to the middle peasant “Santa Clara” - 3: 4.

The hosts twice lost in the long run, but after an hour of the game managed to break ahead thanks to a double of Vinicius Morais. Substitute in the break, the Brazilian took a double for three minutes.

However, the ending was unsuccessful for Benfica. In the 82nd minute, “Santa Clara” recouped from a rather controversial penalty, and in the time added by the referee, Jose Oliveira brought a sensational victory to the guests.

In turn, the “Port” took another middle peasant “Boavista” and also could not print the opponent’s goal for a long time. However, after the goal of Moussa Marega in the 53rd minute, the hosts calmly brought the matter to a rout - 4-0 - and broke away from Benfica in the standings by three points.