Academy youngsters come to the rescue for Barcelona at the Camp Nou, whilst Sevilla registered a much-needed win against Atletico Madrid to take them five points behind Real Madrid. After Saturday, Barcelona are 15 points behind Real Madrid, whilst defending champions Atletico are 12 behind.
Gerard Moreno struck twice for Villarreal as they edged past Real Sociedad by the barest of margins, despite the latter going down to 10 men very early in the game. Alexander Isak opened the scoring for Sociedad, but their lead stood only 6 minutes as Moreno headed home from close range, getting at the end of a Parejo cross.
Mikel Oyarzabal got a straight red in the early minutes of the second half, which put the hosts on backfoot. Villarreal kept themselves on the front foot from then on, and finally broke through with Alberto Moreno’s cross meeting Gerard Moreno in the box. The game saw a frantic finish with Sociedad creating good chances on the counter, but Samuel Chukwueze made it 3-1 to finish things off. This defeat saw Sociedad drop out of the top four temporarily.
Talking of teams that dropped out of the Champions League spots, Atletico Madrid did not do themselves a favor by letting Sevilla off the hook despite having their chances. Ivan Rakitic, the former Barcelona man, opened the scoring for the hosts early in the game before Felipe equalized around the half-hour mark for Atletico.
Just as the game seemed to be heading towards a draw, a Rakitic corner saw the ball pinball its way to Lucas Ocampos, who powered it home with two minutes or normal time remaining. They nicked it right at the end, taking them just five points behind the league leaders.
Barcelona went 2-0 up in next to no time in their fixture against Sevilla. Ferran Jutgla opened the scoring with a brilliant header, which was his first goal in Catalan colors. Gavi got the second three minutes later with a sensational solo effort, and went into the half time break maintaining this lead.
They had a brief setback in the second half, with Raul Guti and Tete Morente scoring in a span of 75 seconds. Out of nowhere, the game was back on level terms with Elche potentially on course for their first win over Barcelona in a decade, but 19-year-old Nico, who came on as a sub for Jutgla, got his second of the league campaign with five minutes remaining as Barca youngsters saved the day for Xavi Hernandez.
Among other results, first half goals from Sergi Guardiola and Catena helped Rayo Vallecano get a 2-0 win over Alaves whilst Celta Vigo had a stellar 3-1 win against Espanyol. Iago Aspas scored and assisted once each for the hosts, as Celta Vigo went into stoppage time with three goals in their bag, but lost a clean sheet with Loren Moron scoring for the visiting unit.
