Málaga CF welcomed Real Sporting de Gijón to La Rosaleda this Thursday evening on LaLiga SmartBank matchday 7, following last weekend’s win in Zaragoza. There were two new changes to Pellicer’s starting-11 tonight compared to the previous game, with Dani Barrio in goal and Benítez on the right wing making his official debut at La Rosaleda.
The heavy rainfall today let up for the match. The Blue and Whites piled the usual high pressure on the rival. Cumic had a goal disallowed for the visitors for clearly being offside in 7’. After the initial quarter of an hour, the Chavarría-Caye pairing generated the first opportunity, with a cross from the first and a header from the latter, prevented by Mariño. This was simply a warning, as minutes later, in 21’, the Malaguistas opened the scoring with a header into goal from Juande following a Caye cross. Sporting had three goal attempts during the remainder of the first half, the work of Djuka on two occasions and the clearest chance for Aitor García in 37’.
In the second half, the Malaguistas tried to take control of the match with great intensity, as they went in search of the Sporting area. Caye had a chance in front of the area, but his shot towards the post was stopped in its tracks by the rival keeper. Immediately afterwards, Sporting gave the home side a scare with a near miss from Gaspar who had just joined play. Then in 57’, the rivals had a goal by Aitor García disallowed for being offside. From this point on, the Blue and Whites had more control and presence in the attacking half, with a standout combination between Chavarría, Luis Muñoz and Ivan Calero, missing out on a shot at the near post, as well as a Juande header stemming from a cross by Cristian, who joined the match in the second half. In the closing stages, Pellicer brought on fresh legs to the pitch, using up all his substitutions. Orlando Sá returned to the field of play, having been unable to play in the last two games due to injury. Far from ending the game in their own territory, Málaga stepped up the attack, with a shot from Benítez and a one on one in which Benkhemassa’s shot was saved by Mariño’s left hand. The last free kick of the match was taken by Djuka, cleared to a corner by Dani Barrio, subsequent corner kick and the end of play.
With this second win on the bounce, the Malaguistas have 13 points, with seven out of nine won at La Rosaleda where the lads remain undefeated, and are sitting in fifth place in LaLiga SmartBank. The next match is on Sunday 25th October against CD Mirandés, kicking off at 20:30 at Martiricos.
