Barcelona are set to play Real Madrid in the Copa del Rey quarter-finals after coming from behind to beat CA Osasuna 2-1 on Thursday and cruise to a 6-1 aggregate victory.
Defending champions Real Madrid host the first leg on Wednesday, with the return match at Barcelona on Jan. 25. The rivals have already met three times this season, with Barcelona winning the two-legged Spanish Super Cup 5-4 on aggregate in August, before a 3-1 victory at Madrid in the league last month.
The two games will take the number of “Clasico” matches in the last nine months to nine. Madrid’s sole victory was in the Copa del Rey final last season.
“That’s the draw for us. We’ll have to prepare well like we always do,” defender Gerard Pique said. “In a Barca-Madrid there are no favorites.”
On a foggy Thursday night, Dejan Lekic deservedly put hosts Osasuna ahead in the 41st minute of a strong first half against a Barcelona lineup that included several “B” team players, with the team having won the first leg 4-0.
Alexis Sanchez leveled by heading in Adriano’s cross in the 47th minute and, with Lionel Messi and Sergio Busquets coming on as substitutes, Barcelona dominated until the end, with Sergi Roberto capping a typical buildup by scoring the winner in the 72nd minute.
Earlier, Gaizka Toquero’s impressive back-heeled goal helped Athletic Bilbao beat third-tier club Albacete 4-0 and they are set to play RCD Mallorca in the last eight.
Bilbao or Mallorca will play either RCD Espanyol or third-division club Mirandes, while Barcelona or Madrid will face the winner of a city derby between Valencia and Levante UD.
Osasuna, also fielding a number of youth team players, pressured the European champions in the first half to disrupt their play.
Pique headed a chance off the line, before goalkeeper Jose Manuel Pinto dived to save Lekic’s volleyed shot in the 17th minute. Lekic again volleyed wide shortly before finally scoring after Raoul Loe eluded defenders near the Barcelona area.
After the restart, Adriano bounced a cross across the face of goal to find Sanchez at the far post for the leveler.
Sanchez was replaced by Messi in the 58th minute and the Ballon d’Or winner settled in by threading the pass through for winger Roberto to shoot past Riesgo into the bottom corner for the winner.
At the San Mames, Toquero controlled the ball inside the area and, with his back to goal, used the back of his foot to make it 3-0 in the 78th minute.
Markel Susaeta scored the opener, reaching Iker Muniain’s through ball, before chipping goalkeeper Alvaro Campos in the 24th minute.
Ander Herrera doubled the lead with a volley into the top corner in the 64th minute after collecting the rebound from Campos’ save from Muniain.
Mikel San Jose scored with a header in the 86th minute.
Fernando Llorente had a number of scoring opportunities in his first match since early last month, before being replaced.
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