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In the 30th round of the 2023/24 La Liga season, Real Madrid beat Athletic Bilbao 2-0 at the Santiago Bernabeu on Sunday evening, courtesy of a fantastic brace from Rodrygo Goes.
The game
Athletic had a surprisingly strong start to the game, pushing the hosts back during the opening minutes and forcing several corners. However, they failed to make it count and in the eighth minute, Real were already ahead. It was their first proper attacking move, which ended with Rodrygo Goes blasting the ball into the top corner from around 20 yards.
Some 15 minutes later, things got worse for Bilbao, with defender Yeray Alvarez forced to leave the pitch through injury. Dani Vivian was called from the bench to take his place in the heart of defence.
For the rest of the first half, the game was mostly contested between the two boxes, but while Bilbao took their first shot on target when the 45th minute had already expired, Real threatened very seriously twice more, through a well-controlled volley hit by Federico Valverde and saved by Julen Agirrezabala, and a header from Aurelien Tchouameni that went inches wide of the post.
After the break, Real moved to extend the lead straight away, and just three minutes in, they created a fine chance for Brahim Diaz, but the former AC Milan man struck the post from around 15 yards. Another three minutes later, Bilbao came close to leveling the score through Inaki Williams who caught a fine volley, but it went straight into the well-positioned Andriy Lunin in the Real goal. Diaz had another chance to increase Real’s lead soon after, but this time his shot from a similar position went over the bar.
A few minutes before the hour mark, Bilbao boss Ernesto Valverde felt it was time to try something different, having seen his team repeatedly failing to cause any difficulties for Los Blancos. Iñigo Ruiz de Galarreta, Malcom Adu Ares and Yuri Berchiche came on, with Beñat Prados, Gorka Guruzeta and Oscar de Marcos making…
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Author : Veselin Trajkovic
Publish date : 2024-03-31 21:23:52
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