Sevilla’s victory in the derby puts them on 50 points, four clear of fourth-placed Real Sociedad. They’re now six behind Real Madrid, eight behind Barcelona, albeit having played one more game. Second place shouldn’t be a pipe dream, not quite yet, though it’s extremely unlikely that both of the leaders will slip up and gift Sevilla their first La Liga title since 1946. Closing in on Champions League football is the important thing, and they’ve taken their first step tonight, throwing the gauntlet down at the feet of Real Sociedad, Getafe, Atletico Madrid and Valencia. Real Betis meanwhile remain in 12th, eight clear of relegation bother. Anyway, thanks for reading this MBM, and welcome back La Liga! Nighty night.
FULL TIME: Sevilla 2-0 Real Betis
Sevilla have won the 131st Gran Derbi! Deservedly so: they were the better side for just about the whole piece, with Ocampos, Diego Carlos and Munir particularly impressive. They cavort in glee, third place consolidated, a place in next year’s Champions League a little closer.
90 min +5: From the set piece, Kounde sends yet another header wide of goal. That’s hat-trick of good chances missed. But the young defender’s getting into good positions. One will fly in soon enough at this rate.
90 min +4: Navas and Suso combine to drive down the right. Suso drops a shoulder to zip into the box, and attempts a curler towards the top left. It’s deflected out for a corner.
90 min +3: A corner for Betis out on the left. Fekir floats it into the mixer. It’s half cleared. Joaquin tries to steer a volley back towards goal, but the ball flies miles over the bar.
90 min +2: The first couple of added minutes are a scrappy nonsense. Sevilla will be more than happy, given Betis had finally woken up.
90 min: There will be six added minutes.
89 min: Bartra grabs at the back of his leg. Hopefully not a hamstring issue. Cramp, it looks like. But he does walk off the field, gesticulating towards the bench on the other side, hoping to be subbed. But Betis have used all their subs, so the visitors are down to ten.
87 min: Betis show their fangs for the first time this evening. Joaquin sends Fekir scampering down the left with a lovely curled pass. Fekir reaches the box and checks back, teeing up Joaquin for a shot towards the bottom right. The shot’s deflected, nearly into the path of Pedraza, but once again Diego Carlos is on hand to deal with the danger, hooking clear, a perfectly timed challenge inside his own box. Why haven’t Betis played with this verve and intensity before?
85 min: A sudden intricate burst from Lainez nearly opens Sevilla up on the right, but Diego Carlos steps across to usher him away from the danger zone with gentle power.
83 min: Betis probe, but to no great effect. Sevilla seem quite happy to let them sniff around, before dealing with any hopeful ball that’s pumped into the box.
81 min: Two more changes by the home side, as Vazquez and Escudero come on for Reguilon and Torres.
79 min: Pedraza comes on for Moreno, and is quickly in the action, giving Vaclik something to do at last. It’s a pea-roller from the edge of the box, and easily gathered by the keeper, but small acorns and all that.
77 min: A gilt-edged chance for Loren, who snatches at Emerson’s ball from the right, ten yards out, with Sevilla’s defence at collective slumber. That could have seeded a few doubts in Sevilla minds. Still time for Betis to get back into this, even if they’ve yet to make Vaclik do any serious work.
76 min: A fine cross-field move as Suso, out on the right, shuttles inside for Banega, who in turn finds Torres, who finally finds Reguilon on the left. Reguilon’s low cross is snaffled by Robles.
75 min: It’s the end of the road for Munir, who limps off after a fine display, to be replaced by Suso.
73 min: Munir is down, having taken a whack to his calf. The teams take the opportunity to tuck into a few restorative pouches of water.
71 min: Sevilla finally grab a piece of this hot substitute action, as the excellent Ocampos and the not-so-impressive De Jong make way for Banega and En-Nesyri.
70 min: Two more changes by Betis, as Borja and Alena are replaced by Joaquin and Loren.
68 min: Betis finally string a few passes together in Sevilla territory. Canales and Moreno complete a couple of triangles down the left, Fekir has a look on the right. Finally Moreno whips a cross from a tight spot near the left-hand corner flag, but Borja can only skim a header wide right from eight yards. Betis have been awfully blunt up front.
66 min: Betis stroke it around the back, but not in particularly competent fashion. Feddal is nearly closed down and stripped of possession by De Jong, a few yards from his own goal. He’s fortunate that the ball clanks out for a goal kick.
64 min: Fekir embarks on a promising run down the right, but with options in the middle, holds onto the ball for one shimmy too many, and he’s dispossessed. Betis’s star signing has been very quiet this evening.
GOAL! Sevilla 2-0 Real Betis (Fernando 62)
A corner for Sevilla out on the right. Jordan swings towards the near post. Ocampos, his back to goal on the edge of the six-yard box, backflicks towards Fernando, who stoops bravely to guide a header into the right-hand portion of the net! A fine goal, and Sevilla are in control of this derby now. Deservedly so.
61 min: Torres, out on the left, shifts the ball quickly to fox Canales, and whips into the box for Kounde, who misses another header from close range. Betis are rocking here.
60 min: A second change for Betis, as Lainez comes on for Tello.
58 min: Munir embarks on a couple of power skitters down the left. Betis look collectively shocked to have fallen behind. They’ll need to regroup quickly.
GOAL! Sevilla 1-0 Real Betis (Ocampos 56 pen)
Ocampos smacks the penalty firmly into the bottom right, sending Robles the wrong way. That was a soft penalty award, and Betis aren’t happy, but Bartra did have his forearm on the back of De Jong’s neck as the pair battled in the air, so they can’t complain too much.
55 min: Philosophical debates. Penalty coming soon.
53 min: PENALTY FOR SEVILLA! After a couple of wasted corners, a third. Bartra climbs all over De Jong and the referee points straight at the spot!
51 min: Guido is robbed by Torres, who tears off towards a light-handed Betis defence. He earns a corner, but before it can be taken, there’s a VAR check over some coming together or other in the back-chasing pack. Nothing doing, so we move on.
49 min: Emerson picks up the first booking of this new era, deserved punishment for an out-of-control slide towards Munir.
47 min: Sevilla should be leading. Navas scampers down the right with great poise and purpose. He fizzes a low cross inside for Jordan, who should slam home from the penalty spot. His effort is 99 percent fresh-air swipe, one percent contact, the ball clanks between his legs, and the danger is over. What a dismal effort. What a waste of a fine chance!
46 min: Betis start fast again. Tello switches play with a glorious left-to-right sweep. Fekir makes his way down the wing and curls infield. Diego Carlos meets the cross with a powerful clearing header.
Here we go again! Sevilla get the ball rolling for the second half. A reminder that both teams can now make five substitutions from a bench of 12. Betis have used up one of those swaps at half-time, replacing Sidnei with Feddal at the heart of their defence.
Half-time infotainment. Here’s the good doctor Sid Lowe on La Liga’s hopes of getting the fans back sooner rather than later ...
... while Jacob Steinberg reports on how the Premier League will go about their business when the ball starts rolling in England next week.
HALF TIME: Sevilla 0-0 Real Betis
Ocampos tests Robles from long distance, but the keeper easily pads the ball away. And that’s the end of the first half. So far, this is a resumption for the purists.
45 min: Ocampos hustles down the right and earns himself a corner. It’s Sevilla’s fifth of the game. The ball’s worked out to Reguilon, on the edge of the D. He lobs forward, in the hope of finding De Jong, but Sidnei bashes a header clear. There will be two added minutes.
43 min: The highly impressive Munir skedaddles in from the left and plays a neat reverse pass that nearly releases De Jong. Munir has the Betis defence in a panic every time he gets the ball.
41 min: De Jong loops a cross in from the right. Reguilon brings it down as he scampers in from the opposite flank. For a second it looks as though he’s going to break through a couple of challenges and make space to shoot, but he loses control and accidentally handles. Peep!
39 min: Canales creams a long-distance shot high and wide of the top-left corner. That was from the best part of 30 yards, at the very limit of realistic ambition, but then nobody in green and white was offering an option, so he was within his rights to roll the dice.
38 min: Now Munir tries a clever flick and turn to the right of the Betis D, and nearly fooled Bartra ... but not quite, as the big defender stands firm. Munir has been excellent so far, immediately back up to speed.
37 min: Munir spins cutely into space down the left yet again. He’s got the mental edge on Emerson. His low cross is slapped out for a corner, from which nothing of interest occurs.
35 min: Ocampos barrels down the right before spraying a fine pass wide left for Reguilon, who is in acres. He’s got too much time to think, and once he’s carefully opened up his body to curl towards the top right, he’s closed down. A wasted opportunity to work Robles in the Betis goal at the very least.
33 min: And we’re back, all nicely hydrated. Fekir drops a shoulder with a view to tearing into the Sevilla box down the right, but Diego Carlos comes crunching across to tackle hard, and put a stop to his gallop.
31 min: A break as everyone takes on some cooling, calming, delicious, life-giving water.
29 min: Alena clumps Jordan in unceremonious fashion. The referee is definitely giving everyone special derby privileges this evening.
27 min: Munir spins elegantly down the left, foxing Emerson and flicking a glorious cross towards De Jong, who should do better from eight yards than heading harmlessly right of goal. That was sensational wingplay from Munir, who should really be chalking up one hell of an assist.
25 min: Another derby challenge as Reguilon comes through the back of Fekir, who was in the process of turning him out on the right-hand touchline. The referee remains patient, but for how much longer?
23 min: Ocampos comes sliding in on Emerson at great speed. He’s lucky that Emerson opts to leap the tackle, because any proper contact would have led to a booking at least.
21 min: A Sevilla corner out on the right. It’s whipped towards the near post, and Kounde must surely score, meeting the ball with a downward header six yards out. But he misses to the right. What a chance that was.
20 min: Despite the lack of RUN HARD and GO banners, the virtual crowd looks and sounds just fine. It’s certainly better than staring at an empty stand. Not perfect, but this is where we are, and it’ll do. Just meet it halfway.
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18 min: Betis win their first corner of the game as Moreno sashays down the left and pings the ball off Navas. Tello plays a risible ball along the byline, Ocampos prepares to blooter clear, and he’s battered from behind by Iglesias. Very poor. “If I had my way, they’d superimpose crowds from some crappy 1980’s 8-bit computer game like Daley Thompson’s Decathlon,” writes Stephen Carr. “It’d look great - the same six characters endlessly repeated, some holding banners with pithy slogans like ‘RUN HARD’ and ‘GO!’.” Good idea. Yes please. But if we’re really going back to the eighties, there should be a bug in the game, too, like there was in International Soccer on the Commodore 64, where you’d be guaranteed a goal if you shot from a certain position near the corner flag. High-scoring thrillers guaranteed, if a little repetitive. The TV companies would be delighted.
16 min: Betis haven’t exactly been under the cosh, but most of the game has been played in their half. They take the sting out of things with some sterile passing around the back.
14 min: Betis fail to clear their lines and allow De Jong another dribble down the right. He wins the second corner of the game. De Jong meets it himself, but his looping header is easy meat for Robles.
12 min: In fact I’ve undersold that Ocampos effort by describing his run as merely making good down the channel. In fact he dribbled hard towards the right-hand edge of the six-yard box, and creamed that shot from a super-tight angle. It would have been a spectacular goal had he kept the ball a couple of inches lower.
10 min: Ocampos makes good down the inside-right channel and unleashes a rising shot that beats Robles but, instead of nestling into the top-right corner, rattles the crossbar. A huge let-off for Betis, who were the better side for the first 90 seconds or so but have seriously lost their way since.
8 min: Space for Regulion on the left. He fizzes low and hard towards the near post, where Sidnei hooks clear. The home side are beginning to impose themselves now.
6 min: Sevilla have found their rhythm now. De Jong probes down the left flank, and his low cross nearly confuses Bartra, but the Betis defender hoicks away in time.
4 min: De Jong drives down the right and earns the first corner of the post-shutdown season. Jordan takes, but to little effect. Robles gathers without too much fuss. “It’s a beautiful day,” trills Peter Oh. “Even with Bono only on the bench, Sevilla probably have The Edge tonight.” A round of applause for Peter, ladies and gentlemen. He’s here all week. Try the oranges.
2 min: Betis are on the front foot in these early stages. Sevilla haven’t quite got going yet.
And we’re off! Betis get the ball rolling. La Liga is back, baby!
But before we start, there’s a period of solemn reflection, in honour of all the souls lost to Covid-19, both in Spain and around the world. The teams gather around the centre circle for a minute’s silence. They’re also paying respects to former Sevilla captain Marcelino Campanal, who passed away in May.
The teams are out! Sevilla wear all white, while Betis sport their green and white vertical stripes. No fans here tonight, of course, but that doesn’t mean there’ll be no atmosphere. The folk behind the Fifa 20 game, EA Sports, will whack on some crowd noise, while virtual fans will be superimposed onto the stands using some fancy/scary TV sorcery. It’s not ideal, but it’s better than nowt, surely. La Liga returns in a couple of minutes!
Pre-Match Post-Lockdown Patter with our old MBM pal Simon McMahon, jonesing hard for Dundee United. “I’ve been waiting for this night for a while. To be honest, I’ve taken bad during lockdown having to actually interact with other humans in my family, but now that midweek La Liga is back I feel I can legitimately ignore them and pretend I’m sending work emails. I don’t think I’ve ever looked forward to a Gran Derbi quite so much. God only knows what I’ll be like when Aston Villa and Sheffield United walk out the tunnel next week.”
Many years of history decanted from an extremely small pot. Sevilla are the dominant partner in this rivalry. They’ve won 61 derbies, scoring 205 times, compared to the Betis record of 38 wins and 157 goals. Both clubs have won La Liga once, Sevilla in 1946, Betis even further back in 1935. Sevilla have five Copa del Rey wins to Betis’s two. And Sevilla storm it in Europe: they hold the all-time record for Europa League / Uefa Cup wins with five, while Betis can only boast a couple of quarter-final appearances in the old Cup Winners’ Cup, and they were soundly beaten on both occasions by Dynamo Moscow (1978) and Chelsea (1998).
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Sevilla leave a couple of big names on the bench in Ever Banega and former Liverpool starlet Suso. Meanwhile it looks as though Betis are taking the La Liga promotional hashtag #BackToWin seriously, naming an attacking side spearheaded by Borja Iglesias with French World Cup winner Nabil Fekir pulling the strings.
The teams
Sevilla: Vaclik, Navas, Kounde, Carlos, Reguilon, Jordan, Fernando, Torres, Ocampos, Munir, De Jong.
Subs: Bono, Gomez, Lopes, Nolito, Banega, Suso, En-Nesyri, Escudero, Vazquez, Mena, Genaro, Juanlu.
Real Betis: Robles, Emerson, Bartra, Sidnei, Moreno, Rodriguez, Alena, Canales, Fekir, Tello, Iglesias.
Subs: Martin, Barragan, Mandi, Feddal, Edgar, Pedraza, Carvalho, Guardado, Rodri, Joaquin, Lainez, Loren.
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Preamble
Welcome to the Estadio Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán, as La Liga follows the Bundesliga in taking its first tentative steps back to normality. After a 93-day hiatus, Spanish football resumes with one of the biggest matches of the season, as Sevilla welcome their city neighbours Real Betis for the 131st Gran Derbi. ¡Esta encendido!
This is the start of a 40-day, 110-game burst of action that will wrap up the covid-interrupted 2019-20 season. Will Barcelona or Real Madrid win the title? Can Espanyol save themselves from ignominious relegation? And who will grab the third and fourth Champions League spots? Only five points currently separate third and seventh: Sevilla, Real Sociedad, Getafe, Atletico Madrid and Valencia will scrap it out over the next five weeks.
Sevilla will be looking to consolidate their position at the head of that particular pack this evening. This fixture’s recent history suggests they’ll do just that; they’ve won five of their last six against Betis at home. They also beat Betis 2-1 at their Estadio Benito Villamarín back in December. Julen Lopetegui’s men will be favourites against a mid-table Betis side.
But Sevilla had won only twice in their last nine games in all competitions before the enforced break, so nothing is certain. True, that recent record isn’t any worse than their rivals’ pre-lockdown run of one victory in eight, but Betis’s last game was a 2-1 win over mighty Real Madrid. A 5-3 win here two seasons ago will also give Betis succour. And it’s a derby, so anything goes.
Betis also have very little riding on this game, local pride aside. Rubi’s side won’t qualify for Europe; neither will they go down. So perhaps they’ll play with a little more freedom than the hosts, who desperately need all three points. Or maybe Sevilla’s superior quality, added to home advantage, will be enough to get the job done. El Gran Derbi kicks off at 9pm UK time, 10pm in Andalusia. La Liga’s back. ¡It’s on!
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