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River Plate, Cerro Porteno qualify for Copa semi-finals

Luciano Dos Santos saved two penalties and scored from the spot himself as Uruguay’s River Plate completed a penalty shootout victory over San Lorenzo in the Copa Sudamericana quarter-finals on Wednesday.

In the day’s other quarter-final, Paraguay’s Cerro Porteno beat Brazil’s Botafogo 3-1 and 5-2 on aggregate.

In the semi-finals, River will play either Liga de Quito of Ecuador or Velez Sarsfield of Argentina, while Cerro Porteno will face either Universidad de Chile or Fluminense of Brazil.

In Buenos Aires, River Plate’s Richard Porta scored a minute after halftime after a mistake by the San Lorenzo defense.

Following San Lorenzo’s 1-0 triumph in the first leg, River’s win by the same score sent the match to penalties.

Dos Santos saved Jonathan Bottinelli’s shot and Gaston Aguirre missed for San Lorenzo, while Jorge Rodriguez and Porta failed for River.

After scoring his own penalty, Dos Santos then made the decisive save from San Lorenzo striker Pablo Pintos to secure the 7-6 shootout win.

In Rio, Jorge Nunez opened the scoring in the 57th minute to put Cerro Porteno in charge against Botafogo.

Andre Lima equalized in the 74th minute, but Alessandro was sent off three minutes later with Botafogo still needing another goal to level the aggregate scores.

Cerro Porteno took advantage of the extra man to rubber-stamp their passage to the semis with goals from Julio Irrazabal in the 88th minute and Luis Caceres in stoppage-time.

The two-legged semi-finals will start next week.
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