Giorgi Mamardashvili’s gloves, a violent header from Hugo Duro that ended in a goal and Valencia’s resistance, outnumbered since 31st in the first half due to Gayà’s expulsion, brought Levante closer to the brink of relegation at Mestalla. The point that Duarte saved, for a team that needs to add three in its desperate adventure to save the category, is not enough. Valencia, with the point, is also moving away from Europe.
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Mamardashvili, Thierry Correia (Foulquier, min. 73), Gayá, Omar Alderete, Gabriel Paulista, Mouctar Diakhaby, Uros Racic, Hugo Guillamón (Vazquez Mayor, min. 45), Carlos Soler (Yunus Musah, min. 92), Gonçalo Guedes (Maxi Gómez, min. 73) and Hugo Duro (Bryan Gil Salvatierra, min. 89)
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Daniel Cárdenas, Miramón (Marc Pubill, min. 79), Son (Marcelo Saracchi, min. 55), Róber, Óscar Duarte, Vezo (Gonzalo Melero, min. 61), Campaign (Soldier, min. 61), Pepelu, Radoja (Enis Bardhi, min. 45), Morales and Dani Gómez
goals 1-0 min. 26: Hugh Hard. 1-1 min. 80: Oscar Duarte.
Referee Jorge Figueroa Vazquez
Yellow cards Gonçalo Guedes (min. 22), Radoja (min. 35), Son (min. 37), Omar Alderete (min. 37), Mamardashvili (min. 69), Hugo Duro (min. 83) and Óscar Duarte (min. 84)
red cards Gayá (min. 30)
The Turia derby, buried by the blow that Valencia received in La Cartuja seven days ago and by the silence in which Levante hid, tiptoed past during the week and hardly made any headlines. Everything was disturbed by a tweet from the Delegation of Peñas del Levante, which related the finals that his team has left to play in the final stretch of the championship with the one that Valencia lost in Seville. The Orriols club, in a clumsy strategic move at the gates of a decisive match against a rival with hardly anything at stake, spread the supporters’ tweet and warmed up a very cold atmosphere until then. The Valencia fans turned their cannons towards Levante and the derby heated up. “To second, to second”, thundered Mestalla. Then, in the meadow, the friction between the black and white and the Catalans jumped.
Levante started the game with a setback. Deportivo Alavés had just beaten a clueless Villarreal for the Cup after Cádiz equalized the night before at the Sánchez Pizjuán. When he turns on the tail of the classification, everyone is aware of what the companion in the platoon of the damned does. The technicians did not save anything. Bordalás squeezed his usual and Alessio, who recovered Campaña, his own. Confronted with the ownership of the club and pondering if he continues and fulfills his contract next year, the coach demanded one last effort from the generals of him Gayà, Gabriel and Guedes, to the limit muscularly.
Until he was sent off for a foul on Miramón, in an action that required a VAR review, Gayà, intense and combative, offered the best version that is remembered at Mestalla since he was injured against Athletic in the Cup. His classic center warped from the left, slightly tilting the body back, he led the way to the first goal. Hugo Duro, lighter, but hungry and eager, sneaked the central granota, Duarte and Vezo, and violently headed the net. The captain left for letting go of Miramón’s arm and adding a direct red card in the 31st minute.
As a result of Gayà’s expulsion, the match got muddy. The two teams sped up and entered a melee that suffocated the crowd but scared the game away. Mamardashvili, the giant that Valencia found in Georgia, became as long as his surname and his victim was Dani Gómez, who crashed into that wall up to three times. The Georgian’s second stop was a one-on-one with the one from Alcorcón in the last play of the first half after a theft by the striker on Diakhaby, who was giddy throughout the game.
Bordalás corrected Gayà’s loss with the boy from Paterna, Jesús Vázquez, and Alessio changed the system by withdrawing a central defender, Vezo. Levante took control of the match and Valencia, in inferiority, wrinkled in front of Mamardashvili. The Granota, dominant, circulated very slowly and the locals only suffered when Morales rode with the ball biting the space behind the triplet of black and white central defenders. Valencia seemed comfortable defending. In those, Enis Bardhi violently crashed a shot into the crossbar with Mamardashvili, for the first time, watching.
The tie came from a set piece. Morales hung a lateral free kick and Duarte won the jump, the duel with his black and white pairs and the ball to hole. The match was shaken again, but the scoreboard no longer moved.
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