the season of Sevilla it is a gloomy corridor. But the aura of the Europa League, the tournament he has managed to win six times, offers glimpses at the end of the tunnel. Mendilibar’s team drew a golden tie at Old Trafford after a bad game where United ended up trusting. The initial gale for Ten Hag’s men allowed them to take a two-goal lead. They had countless occasions to leave the tie sentenced, but the Sevillian team took advantage of the outcome to equalize the score and gamble on a moral and sporting advantage at the Sánchez Pizjuán.
The game started as one more line in the story line that has plunged a team that had made the noble zone their natural habitat into mediocrity. Sevilla seemed triggered by Monchi’s poor sports planning and the incapable initial proposal of a Mendilibar who opted for a lineup without ‘9’, plagued by rotations, thinking about the fight not to be relegated (this weekend he has a key duel against Valencia) and with starters who are not. Although heThe changes in the second half revolutionized the duel. Because Navas forced United’s defensive error that ended in Malacia’s first own goal and En-Nesyri equalized, the work of Maguire.
Nianzou does not give the level
Sevilla had to wait until April to play with the central pair that was going to replace Diego Carlos and Koundé, one of the most solid last year. HoweverMarcao and Nianzou are an insufficient duo even for the slowest rhythm in the League, which all the Spanish teams end up paying, except Real Madrid, in this type of match. The first accused the lack of activity at the beginning and the second, for which Monchi paid 20 million, does not give the level.
It didn’t take long for Ten Hag’s United to create problems, who did not resent the loss of his best man, Marcos Rashford. Just 25 seconds were enough for him to enjoy the great first opportunity. Only a few centimeters deprived Sancho of opening the scoring. Bono, back in the starting lineup, gave a prodigious hand to a left-footed shot from Antony before Sabitzer’s first goal.
Sabitzer, a deadly midfielder
Bruno Fernandes, spectacular tonight, leaked a ball between the dolls of the Seville defense that the Austrian midfielder solved with a hard shot. Sevilla fell into the United trap over and over again, which attracted them with spaces to kill them on the counter. Sabitzer put Mendilibar’s team back on the wall soon after, with a second goal that mirrored the first.
Good against Martial, who took advantage of a slip from Nianzou to expel the visitors from the match. Despite the depression De Gea premiered his gloves in the discount to abort a very clear opportunity for the outlaw Nianzou who saved a limping Varanne, who was substituted at half-time by Maguire.
Get out of Old Trafford alive
Sevilla’s mission in the second half was to get out of Old Trafford alive. A very subjective need that involved competing against Manchester United, a team used to temporizing matches. Mendilibar brought on Navas, but not as a winger, but as an interior, returning to its origins. The change gave ground to the visitors, but those from Ten Hag were waiting for the cons to leave the tie sentenced.
Antony was close at game time, when he left Marcao lying down after a new mess by Nianzou. Her thread was poisoned until it violently hit the crossbar. The Brazilian made Sevilla desperate with his electric game and that sea of dribbles that walk on the thin edge of genius and ridicule. United was not so scared, because despite the initial storm, they did not even offer the best version of themselves. However, Sevilla was unable to shoot on goal.
Comeback in the denouement
In minute 67, Mendilibar finally brought on a striker, taking advantage of the fact that his counterpart was withdrawing pieces like Bruno Fernandes in the face of the fight that he maintains in the Premier to enter the Champions League. The match entered the phase of interruptions, with Acuña and Montiel entering the fray. A canchero spirit that Sevilla needs so much to get out of the quagmire. Marcao ended up taking a step forward, more comfortable in the fight with Weghorst, a fixed striker.
When the game seemed doomed to ‘game over’, Sevilla brought out all its mystique in the last quarter of an hour. Fernando filtered a pass into the gap that Malacia let through without being aware that Navas was behind. He stole his wallet and the Dutchman ended up putting it in his own. Suddenly, the breath of the Sevilla fans was heard at the top of their lungs. Old Trafford ended up plunged into a thunderous silence with Maguire’s 2-2 draw, in which he hit a header from En Nesyri that turned the emotional compass of this match upside down. Sevilla, still buried, is the Europa League.