Ivan Bolado scored an 86th minute winner to fire Racing Santander into the UEFA Cup with a 1-0 win over Osasuna on Sunday.
Racing will now hope to hold onto their highly-regarded coach Marcelino with Sevilla and Valencia interested in his services.
“It is just reward for the whole season,” Marcelino said. “I am really happy because it goes through your mind that maybe you can miss out on something that you really deserve.”
PHOTO: AP
Racing had looked set to miss out after Real Mallorca beat Real Zaragoza 3-2 — a result that sees Zaragoza relegated from the top flight.
Mallorca did what they could winning their final six games with goals from Pichichi winner Daniel Guiza, his 10th goal in seven games, and strikes from Pierre Webo and Gonzalo Castro sealing a 3-2 win.
Zaragoza were sixth last season and qualified for the UEFA Cup, but must now prepare for life in the second division after a turbulent campaign in which they have had four coaches.
PHOTO: AP
“The players are demoralized in the dressing room, some of the them are crying because it is a huge disappointment,” coach Manolo Villanova said. “We are in the second division and we have to slowly get used to the idea. Now we just have to focus on coming back up for our fans.”
Recreativo Huelva shared a 1-1 draw with Valladolid that keeps both teams in the first division.
At one stage Recre were set to be relegated — after Oliveira leveled at 1-1 for Zaragoza — but Mallorca won to ease their fears.
Earlier Spanish international David Villa scored twice, taking his season’s tally to 18, in what could be his final appearance for Valencia as they defeated Atletico Madrid 3-1 on Sunday.
Villa, 26, is expected to make a big summer move after watching Valencia fight relegation rather than for a place in the Champions League, but he gave the club a leaving present with two goals to help his team triumph on the last day of the season.
Valencia’s veteran goalkeeper Santiago Canizares is also set to say goodbye after more than a decade at the club, saying he is ready for retirement at the age of 38.
“The most important thing was that I was lucky enough to say goodbye on the pitch — something that would not have been possible under the previous coach [Ronald Koeman],” Canizares said.
Canizares was discarded from the Valencia squad by Koeman and told to find a new club.
Elsewhere, Michael Laudrup said adios to Getafe on Sunday after just one season at the club as his team drew 1-1 with Real Betis.
Laudrup guided Getafe to the Kings Cup final and the UEFA Cup quarter-final — where they were seconds from defeating Bayern Munich — but the Dane recently confirmed that he would be leaving.
Champions Real Madrid were presented with the league trophy in a glitzy celebration party at the Santiago Bernabeu on Sunday, with captain Raul lifting the trophy.
Real defeated relegated Levante 5-2 after the visitors decided to call off their strike in protest of unpaid wages and bonuses.
Sevilla also rounded off a difficult season with a convincing 4-1 thrashing of Athletic Bilbao, but Daniel Alves and Luis Fabiano did not have a farewell match as they were missing through suspension.
Brazilian Alves will be hot property this summer, with Barcelona and Chelsea vying for his signature, while Fabiano has already indicated that he will leave too.
Spanish La Liga
Team | P | GD | PTS |
1.Real Madrid | 38 | 48 | 85 |
2.Villarreal | 38 | 23 | 77 |
3.Barcelona | 38 | 33 | 67 |
4.Atletico Madrid | 38 | 19 | 64 |
5.Sevilla | 38 | 26 | 64 |
6.Racing Santander | 38 | 1 | 60 |
7.Mallorca | 38 | 15 | 59 |
8.Almeria | 38 | -3 | 52 |
9.Deportivo La Coruna | 38 | -1 | 52 |
10.Valencia | 38 | -14 | 51 |
11.Athletic Bilbao | 38 | -3 | 50 |
12.Espanyol | 38 | -10 | 48 |
13.Real Betis | 38 | -6 | 47 |
14.Getafe | 38 | -4 | 47 |
15.Valladolid | 38 | -15 | 45 |
16.Recreativo Huelva | 38 | -20 | 44 |
17.Osasuna | 38 | -7 | 43 |
18.Real Zaragoza | 38 | -11 | 42 |
19.Murcia | 38 | -29 | 30 |
20.Levante | 38 | -42 | 26 |
Note: standings of teams on the same points are decided by head-to-head results
SOURCE: AFP
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier