Barcelona, Atletico Madrid and Sevilla on Wednesday eased into the last 16 of the Copa del Rey, but Basque duo Athletic Bilbao and Real Sociedad were eliminated in stunning fashion by third-tier opposition in SD Formentera and Lleida Esportiu respectively.
Already leading 3-0 from the first leg, Barca boss Ernesto Valverde made 10 changes from Sunday’s top-of-the-table clash at Valencia, with Lionel Messi and Luis Suarez among those to drop out for a 5-0 rout of Real Murcia.
Paco Alcacer kept up his fine strike rate this season with his fourth goal of the campaign from just more than 400 minutes on the field when he headed home Aleix Vidal’s pass on 16 minutes.
Barca had to wait until 10 minutes into the second half to double their advantage when captain for the night Gerard Pique tapped into an empty net from another Vidal cross.
Vidal then completed a fine team move himself when he headed home Nelson Semedo’s cross.
Denis Suarez and Jose Manuel Arnaiz rounded off the scoring.
Fernando Torres scored his first two goals of the season as Atletico saw off Elche’s first-leg resistance to progress 4-1 on aggregate with a 3-0 win at the Wanda Metropolitano.
Jose Maria Gimenez gave a strong Atletico side the lead with a thunderous downward header on the half-hour mark.
Two minutes later, Torres swept home from a narrow angle for his first goal at Atletico’s new home and then doubled his account by firing in off the bar 22 minutes from time.
Wissam Ben Yedder scored twice in the opening six minutes as Sevilla cruised past Cartagena 4-0 to seal a 7-0 aggregate win in the absence of coach Eduardo Berizzo.
Berizzo underwent surgery on a cancerous tumor of the prostate on Tuesday, with his assistant Ernesto Marcucci taking charge while he recovers.
Paulo Henrique Ganso and Joaquin Correa were also on target for the five-time winners.
The stories of the night came in the Basque country, where both Formentera and Lleida struck late to secure huge upsets.
Formentera’s population of 12,000 would fit four times over into Athletic’s San Mames, but the visitors from a tiny island off Ibiza stunned Bilbao thanks to a 97th-minute winner from Alvaro Muniz to advance 2-1 on aggregate.
Athletic’s rivals Sociedad suffered a similar fate as they blew a 2-0 lead on the night and 3-0 advantage on aggregate to lose on away goals to Lleida.
Diego Llorente and Juanmi put the La Liga side in a commanding position before halftime, but second-half goals by Aitor Nunez, Manu Molina and Bojan Radulovic handed Lleida a famous win.
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
Rafael Nadal on Wednesday said the upcoming French Open would be the moment to “give everything and die” on the court after his comeback from injury in Barcelona was curtailed by Alex de Minaur. The 22-time Grand Slam title winner, back playing this week after three months on the sidelines, battled well, but eventually crumbled 7-5, 6-1 against the world No. 11 from Australia in the second round. Nadal, 37, who missed virtually all of last season, is hoping to compete at the French Open next month where he is the record 14-time champion. The Spaniard said the clash with De Minaur was
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