Sevilla 3-1 Mallorca; Back on Track

By: Anthony | May 11th, 2009

My deepest apologies for my mini-hiatus from the blog but I had some personal problems to deal with over the past week and things haven’t exactly been easy nor have I had time to really do anything but I’m back now and that’s all that matters.

The situation in Nervión was quite the opposite from my personal one in the sense that things were definitely all good.

To say we’re “back on track” is an understatement because so many things against the boys from Palma went right. Kanouté and Fabiano look like they’re finally starting to click again (shame its the end of the season now), the midfield was solid, and most importantly – we’re back to our winning ways.

Jiménez started a bit of a different lineup this week with Mosquera at right back and Adriano at left, Capel on the left flank for Diego Perotti and a Duscher/Renato pairing in central midfield.

The beginning of the match was pretty lively with the match going from end to end and on the 14th minute we got the perfect opportunity to go ahead when Kanouté just missed Navas’ pin point cross. This came back to haunt us seconds later as Mallorca striker Aduriz received a cross from the left, made minced meat out of Julien Escudé and slotted it past Palop.

Right after though, Escudé almost made up for his poor defending when he hit a perfect header but was denied by the crossbar. In the 25th minute our bad luck continued when Luis Fabiano did all the hard work but was denied by the woodwork.

We were completely dominating the match and despite all our bad luck, it only took another 5 minutes before we finally pulled equal. Fabiano was fouled inside the box and therefore was awarded a penalty. Up stepped Kanouté who scored with relative ease and drew us equal with 1 goal a piece.

The half ended pretty nervy when we seemed too content and Varela hit a shot at Palop which forced him to make a difficult save but in the end, we luckily went into the half at 1-1.

We didn’t waste time as right after the break as Fabiano scored a pure golazzo when he took the ball from just outside the box, dummied two defenders and put it past Moya with ease to put us ahead 2-1. It only took us another 16 minutes to grab another goal when Navas broke down the right flank and smashed his shot in the top left corner.

On the 88th minute however, Duscher picked up his second yellow card and was therefore sent off. Not like it really mattered at this point because we had all three points but at the same time, it will be a big loss for next week’s game.

With Valencia, Atlético and Deportivo all winning this past weekend we still have to be on top form when closing out the season in the next three weeks because if we have the slightest slip-up, any of these three teams can catch us. We really don’t have the best of luck as the one day we need the mierda to win, they didn’t and the same goes for Barça. This does show the tightness of La Liga and proves the fact that we will have to perform with the highest intensity for the rest of the campaign.