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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Sport
Alex Hess and agencies

European roundup: Barcelona rescue late draw as Milan go top of Serie A

Luuk de Jong (right) celebrates with Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang after scoring Barcelona’s late equaliser at Espanyol.
Luuk de Jong (right) celebrates with Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang after scoring Barcelona’s late equaliser at Espanyol. Photograph: Quique García/EPA

A 96th-minute header from the substitute Luuk De Jong rescued a 2-2 draw for Barcelona at their city rivals Espanyol. Both sides had a man sent off in the closing stages and Espanyol looked set for a first league victory over Barça in 16 years before De Jong turned in Adama Traoré’s cross.

Xavi Hernández’s side moved back into La Liga’s fourth and final Champions League spot, level on 39 points with Atlético Madrid. It had looked like Barça would be in for a comfortable evening when they took the lead inside the first two minutes, Pedri turning in Jordi Alba’s cross.

Ferran Torres and Traoré went close for the visitors but they were pegged back on the stroke of half-time as Sergi Darder curled an effort in from the edge of the box after good work from Raúl de Tomás. Darder then returned the favour as he sent De Tomás away with a ball over the top that had looked to have won the game.

Tempers flared late on as Gerard Piqué and Nico Melamed were sent off after a coming together off the ball before De Jong’s late equaliser.

Nabil Fekir struck twice to help third-placed Real Betis keep up their fine form with a 4-2 win at rock-bottom Levante, who had Roberto Soldado sent off late on.

Milan climbed to the top of Serie A with a 1-0 win over Sampdoria on Sunday, as an eighth-minute strike from the in-form Rafael Leão proved decisive at San Siro.

The Portugal forward collected a long clearance from the Milan goalkeeper, Mike Maignan, skipped past his marker and found the bottom corner from a narrow angle to score his 10th goal of the season.

Milan’s Rafael Leão (right) celebrates his goal with teammate Brahim Díaz.
Milan’s Rafael Leão (right) celebrates his goal with teammate Brahim Díaz. Photograph: Daniele Mascolo/Reuters

The Sampdoria goalkeeper, Wladimiro Falcone, made a string of fine stops, palming over a fierce Junior Messias strike near half-time before blocking an acrobatic Olivier Giroud effort after the break. Falcone denied Giroud again from a header and also saved Ante Rebic’s shot, but the visitors could not threaten Maignan’s goal.

Milan move ahead of Internazionale and Napoli, who drew 1-1 in Naples on Saturday. Inter are one point behind with a game in hand with Napoli two points back in third place.

Danilo scored a stoppage-time equaliser to rescue a 1-1 draw for Juventus at Atalanta and earn a point that could prove crucial to his team’s top-four ambitions. The Brazilian headed in from a corner in the 92nd minute, cancelling out a long-range thunderbolt from Ruslan Malinovskyi that had put Atalanta on the verge of reclaiming fourth place. Both sides had chances in a gripping encounter, as Atalanta’s goalkeeper Marco Sportiello denied Dusan Vlahovic with a superb save and Hans Hateboer hit the bar for the hosts.

Bryan Cristante rescued a point for Roma in stoppage time in their 2-2 draw at 10-man Sassuolo. Tammy Abraham put the visitors into the lead from the spot after a Vlad Chiriches handball but Chris Smalling’s own-goal, caused by a howler from keeper Rui Patrício, levelled things up before Hamed Traoré made it 2-1 to Sassuolo, who soon went down to 10 men. Cristante’s 94th-minute header keeps José Mourinho’s side within six points of the top four.

Nabil Fekir struck twice to help third-placed Real Betis keep up their fine form with a 4-2 win at rock-bottom Levante, who had Roberto Soldado sent off late on.

In Germany, Marco Reus scored twice to lead Borussia Dortmund to a 3-0 win at Union Berlin and cut Bayern Munich’s Bundesliga lead to six points. It also went some way to answering mounting criticism after Dortmund’s 5-2 loss at home to Bayer Leverkusen the previous Sunday, which had allowed Bayern to pull nine points clear.

“Now it’s important that we also enjoy the win,” Reus said. “That we were able to let out all the frustration we built up in the last game and during the week. We had a very, very restless week.” And Hoffenheim took themselves up to fifth with a 2-0 win against Bielefeld.

Marco Reus makes it 2-0 to Borussia Dortmund at Union Berlin.
Marco Reus makes it 2-0 to Borussia Dortmund at Union Berlin. Photograph: Alexandre Simões/Borussia Dortmund/Getty Images

In Ligue 1 Arkadiusz Milik scored with a spectacular overhead kick to hand Marseille a late 2-1 win at struggling Metz on Sunday as they consolidated second place.

Lorient had earlier boosted their hopes of beating the drop with a 0-0 draw at Monaco. Lorient keeper Mathieu Dreyer denied Wissam Ben Yedder and Jean Lucas to frustrate the hosts and damage their top-three hopes.

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