The title candidates who just won’t let go couldn’t quite hold on either, leaving Madrid six points clear on topIvan Rakitic had the ball in his hands and Sevilla’s fate in them too, or at least that’s how it felt. On moments like this titles turn, so it goes. They had spent the last two months hanging in there, the team still standing even as players were falling, clinging on for a chance like this. But time was running out on the first day of the rest of their season, the opportunity they had waited for untaken and slipping away again. Until suddenly, almost out of nothing, it was given back. All they now had to do was score a...
The trauma of the manager’s sacking by Spain and a bitterly brief stay at Real Madrid is all but forgotten with his latest clubThere was a moment late on Sunday night when the camera closed in on Luuk de Jong which seemed to say something about trust and team, and what they’re building together at Sevilla. He had scored at the Camp Nou – as he had done against Real Madrid, Atlético Madrid, Real Betis, Inter and Manchester United – but having opened the scoring inside eight minutes the ball had been back in play just 41 seconds when Philippe Coutinho equalised. Now, withdrawn six minutes from the end of an exhausting evening, the former Newcastle striker sat in the...
A no-look penalty and another Monchi recruitment masterclass leaves Sevilla close to a Champions League returnLucas Ocampos was looking the other way when Sevilla scored the penalty that virtually secured their return to the Champions League last night – and he was the one taking it. The man who had racked up 13 goals and one last minute save, the forward who had scored one and stopped another just six days earlier, pulling on the goalie top and pulling off a 101st minute rescue mission, was on the spot again. Bouncing the ball and beaming, if the responsibility was his the appearance belonged to a man without a care in the world. What happened next did, too.There were a few...
This is the game you can’t afford to lose, and the Sevilla coach’s wild eyes showed what winning the 130th derby meantWhen it was over, Julen Lopetegui started roaring, mouth so wide you could fit his half of Seville inside. He wore a wild look in his eyes and punched the air with the kind of force that dislocates shoulders. Which might not sound so unusual, but it is for him. Éver Banega was the first to leap into his arms, and then others followed, violence in the embrace.Across the pitch, in the far corner where Banega was going now, the rest of Sevilla’s players hopped about, doing that disco thing, waving their arms up and down and shouting. Way...
Exhilarating, passionate and very sevillano, Saturday’s derby saw Joaquín Caparrós oversee another triumph over BetisSomewhere in the middle of the smoke and the bodies, Sevilla’s bus began its 640-metre journey, slowly opening a path through the palms hammering at its side. Police vans escorted it along Calle Luis de Morales and, as the crowd parted, fireworks turning everything red, fans saw their manager sitting on the front row. Joaquín Caparrós wore a slightly manic smile, shook his fists, applauded, and thumped at the window. Outside, some ran to keep up. There wasn’t far to go: the bus turned left, left again and drew to a halt in front of the 480-square-metre, 200,000-tile mosaic, the finest façade in football, with its...