Real Sociedad starts a draw against Valencia despite playing with one less from the 15th minute

After a happy and somewhat lucky start, Real’s luck changed as the minutes went by, and he had no choice but to review all the chapters of his resistance manual. He herded a draw, a treasure against a hungry Valencia but with an empty fridge.

Le Normand, Elustondo, Diego Rico, Illarramendi (Gorosabel, min. 45), Remiro, Merino (Ander Guevara, min. 82), Brais (Jon Pacheco, min. 45), Martín Zubimendi, Sörloth, Zubeldia and Carlos Fernández (Jon Magunacelaya, minute 45)

Samuel Lino, Eray Cömert, Marcos André (Hugo Duro, min. 61), Gayá, Yunus Musah (Foulquier, min. 74), Andre Almeida, Mamardashvili, Gabriel Paulista (Cenk Özkacar, min. 29), Thierry Correia, Justin Kluivert (Samu Castillejo, min. 74) and Hugo Guillamón (Nico González, min. 61)

goals 1-0 min. 10: Hugo Guillamón (pp). 1-1 min. 24: Samuel Linen.

Referee Jose Luis Munuera Montero

Yellow cards Diego Rico (min. 7) and Martín Zubimendi (min. 90)

red cards Elustondo (min. 16)

Football hadn’t gone beyond a futile touch when Thierry’s heels slipped from his boots in a seemingly innocuous exit from the ball. The slip left a wide corridor for Illarramendi, who entered the area, crossed in parallel and Hugo Guillamón, who is from San Sebastian but does not play for Real, beat his teammate Mamardashvili in his attempt to clear.

Without doing too much yet, the sky opened up for Imanol’s team, who put the game on their turf, until Aritz Elustondo, five minutes later, did not measure well in a cross with Lino and dug his boot into his ankle. After a long visit to the VAR, Munuera expelled the Real player, who was left with one less for the next 75 minutes of the game. The hodgepodge was taken advantage of by Valencia, who went forward and it didn’t take long to level, with a shot by Lino from the edge of the area. Until that moment, the group led by Gattuso had tried to knead the ball near the area, but without yeast the dough did not grow. With Guillamón thinking about the error in Real’s goal, and failing more than necessary, Valencia played handball on the verge of falling into the passive. When Lino found the crack, it seemed that the party would tilt inexorably towards the Valencian side.

The bewilderment of the following minutes could have hurt the Real, but with indestructible mental strength, with the stands behind, fingernails with the referee’s decisions, he put up with it as best he could until the break, to calm things down, receive the corresponding instructions and tighten the nuts. Imanol took the appropriate measures to avoid water leaks and reduce the one that entered. In view of the results, the realistic technician did it perfectly. He made three hit changes for the second half. He removed a striker, reinforced the midfield and placed sandbags in defense, while Gattuso sent his men forward, although he found himself with very tight lines, few spaces and a wall in front of Remiro, which he barely forced. Real had the best chance in an action by Magunacelaya that Sorloth finished off the crossbar. Valencia only had one, in a quick free kick that caught the local defense clueless. Marcos André shot close to the post.

The Real did not allow any more oversights, firm in its defensive positions. He endured the downpour, which was more like autumn sirimiri, and scored a point. More than could have been expected playing inferior from the first quarter of an hour. Imanol’s resistance manual worked.