Seville threatens Barcelona with the 2010 scenario in the Spanish Cup
Seville seeks to repeat its 2010 achievement, when it overthrew Barcelona in the semi-finals of the Spanish Cup in football, when it hosts it tomorrow at Ramon Sanchez Pisjuan stadium in the first leg of the semi-finals of the 119th edition.
Sevilla beat Barcelona 2-1 at home at Camp Nou, before losing back in Andalusia and reaching the quarter-finals on their way to the fifth and final title in the competition when they beat Atletico Madrid 2-0 in the final match.
The Andalusian team reached the final match twice after that, in 2016 and 2018, and lost to Barcelona in the very first 0-2 after the extension and by five straight goals.
Sevilla is hoping at least to repeat the result of the quarter-final first leg of the competition two years ago when it beat the Catalans with a clean double, before suffering a humiliating defeat 1-6.
Seville has been going through a good period recently, as it won its last four league matches and entered into strong competition with Barcelona and Real Madrid for second place, trailing them by one point and 8 points behind leaders Atlético Madrid, who has a postponed match.
Sevilla, led by coach Julen Lopetegui, has a balanced squad in all lines, including elements of experience, foremost among which are captain Jess Navas and former Barcelona midfielder Ivan Rakic and Munir El Haddadi, who recently got the green light to defend the colors of his country of origin, Morocco, and strengthened it in the winter transfer period with Argentine playmaker Alejandro "Babu" Gomes, who opened his goalscoring lead in the first match in color, when he scored the second goal in a hat-trick of victory over Getafe on Saturday, in addition to the second-highest scorer in the Moroccan international League, Youssef Nassiri (13 goals).
Seville breathed a sigh of relief after reassurance of Ocampos' condition, as the tests he underwent yesterday showed that he had not sustained a fracture or ankle ligaments after a strong intervention from Getafe player Djene Dakonam received a red card.
The Andalusian club's technical staff said that Ocampos, who left the stadium in severe pain on a stretcher, suffered a second-degree sprain in the left ankle, without specifying a date for his return to the stadiums, but Spanish media indicated that he needed a period of four to six weeks to recover.
Barcelona, in turn, suffers from absences in their defense line due to injury, most notably Gerard Pique, Uruguayan Ronald Araujo and Sergi Roberto.
And it is certain that his Dutch coach Ronald Koeman will push his captain and Argentine star Lionel Messi as a mainstay after he kept him on the bench in the last match in the league against Real Betis (3-2) before joining him at the beginning of the second half and succeeding in striking a 1-1 (59) tie two minutes later. Coming off the place of Ricky Butch.
The two teams meet back next Wednesday at the Camp Nou stadium.
The two teams painstakingly booked their cards to the round of four, specifically Barcelona, who achieved a thrilling remontada in front of Granada, transforming his two clean goals until the 88th minute into a 5-3 victory after the extension, and before that he needed a penalty shootout to overcome the second-class obstacle Rayo Vicano, while Sevilla put an end to the adventure Almeria from the second division by beating them 1-0, and they crushed Valencia, the 2019 champion, with three goals.
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