Athletic Club will play again for the second consecutive year in the semifinals of the Copa del Rey after beating Valencia 1-3, a team that in the last edition deprived them of reaching the final and that tonight in mestalla signed a calamitous match.
Valencia transferred all its ills from the League to the Cup and added offensive ineffectiveness, a lethal combination to glimpse the slightest option of qualifying against a rival who played very comfortable The whole game.
Both teams came out with many precautions. The bad moment in LaLiga for the two teams and the fact that they played the pass to the semifinals in one game caused them to come out very corseted on the offensive side and more concerned with maintaining their defensive composure.
The first half hour of play was completely placid for the goalkeepers but the game changed with the first goal of the game. A bad ball release from Diakhaby led to Athletic’s recovery in the upper zone and a good header from Iñaki Williams was hunted by Muniain to shoot Mamardashvili.
After the goal the nerves surfaced in Valencia and the whistles in Mestalla. However, in an isolated action, Diakhabyin offensive tasks, a great play was marked with a self-pass in the area and his cross to the far post ended up introducing De Marcos into his own goal trying to avoid the shot from Sam Lino.
Valencia barely enjoyed the tie, since just a couple of minutes later Athletic was ahead again, after a great offensive action by the Basque team in the Valencian area between Berenguer and the partnership of the Williams brothers, in which Iñaki gave up Nico to make it 1-2 in the last minute of the first act.
At the restart, Valverde He gave clear instructions to press very high to take advantage of Valencia’s doubts when the ball was released. Athletic was looking for the third and the locals’ legs were shaking.
Gattuso tried to shake his team with a triple change but not for those. His team did not contribute anything in attack and Athletic found themselves with a penalty, in which the VAR warned of the big hill with a clear kick epic war a Nico Williams, what Vesga It made it 1-3, with a quarter of an hour to go, which left the tie sentenced given the ineffectiveness of the local team, which signed one of its worst games of the season.
Scarf at Mestalla, shouts of ‘Peter (Lim), vete ya’ and a dangerous horizon in the League for Valencia, while Athletic is once again one step away from fighting again for their favorite title.
Datasheet:
1. Valencia: Mamardashvili; Foulquier, Diakhaby (Cenk, m.46), Commerce, Gaia; William (Marcos Andrew, m.75), Musah (Almeida, m.57)), Ilaix Moriba; Lino, Castillejo (Fran Perez, m.57) and Cavani (Hugo Duro, m.57).
3. Athletic Club: Aguirrezabala; De Marks, Vivian, Yeray, Yuri; Blacksmith (Dani Garcia, m.79), Vesga; Nico Williams (Raul Garcia, m.93), Muniain (Sancet, m.79), Berenguer; Iñaki Williams.
goals: 0-1, m.35: Muniain. 1-1, m.43: De Marcos, own goal. 1-2, m.45: Nico Williams. 1-2, m.74: Vesga, penalty.
Referee: Carlos Del Cerro Grande (C. Madrid). He admonished Diakhaby, Moriba and Cömert for Valencia, and Vivian, Sancet and Aguirrezabala for Athletic.
incidences: Match corresponding to the quarterfinals of the Copa del Rey played at the Mestalla stadium in front of 45,040 spectators.
