There was a lot of football in the middle of the week, and in Spain they decided to continue the cup traditions of recent times, and the Super Cup of the country smoothly moved into the round of 16 of the national Cup. And there, the recent participants of the tournament in the “format of four” in Saudi Arabia had time to return to their homeland. At the same time, the loser of that final, Real Madrid, had an advantage on the day of rest, compared to the winner, Barcelona of Catalonia, and it seemed that Celta Vigo in the duel at the Santiago Bernabeu should cause less damage than Sevilla Betis for the “Blaugranas”.

In general, intrigue was sought everywhere in this confrontation, both in the fact that the Celts had a considerable number of pupils from the same Barca or Galacticos, as well as in the choice of Carlo Ancelotti in favor of the Ukrainian Andriy Lunin in goal. And he could have missed already in the first minutes, if Starfelt’s header from Alonso’s pass fell a little below the crossbar, which the ball eventually hit.

However, Real avoided the quick appearance of problems, after which they began to play the ball in attack. For a long time, the Madrid players did not do anything good in this regard, but they spent the final phase of the first half powerfully and secured an advantage. But not without a touch of scandal. At the 37th minute, Lunin jumped at Svedberg’s feet in front of the goalkeeper and everyone saw the reason for awarding a penalty, because contact with the attacker’s legs took place, except for the referees’ brigade. Even VAR didn’t help. I wonder why?

An important point in this matter is also the fact that Real immediately counterattacked with Mbappe’s lunge on the left flank, who dragged the ball to the penalty area and from an acute angle punched into the near post over the goalkeeper’s shoulder. And even there was some kind of delay from the head referee, but no one canceled the goal, so Ancelotti’s team went to the break with the advantage in the score.

And she returned to the field in order to double it at the very beginning of the second half. Vinicius received a pass to the left wing of a free kick from Diaz and beat the goalkeeper with a low kick. Celta began to make the first substitutions in response, because there was no point in dragging it out any longer. But it did not help – Real continued to attack and created several more very good moments for Mbappé and the Brazilian, but they did not score.

Madrid even scored a third time in the 77th minute, but the goal of the fresh Güler into an empty net was canceled due to an offside by Vinicius, who played the Turk from Mbappe’s pass to the left wing of the other side’s possession. And then Ancelotti’s team decided that they could start fooling around in defense, and in eight minutes they managed to lose a two-goal advantage on an even ground.

First, Kamavinga made a mistake on the left flank of the defense, and Lunina upset Bamba, and soon Asensio played with his “old-school” style of playing in defense and brutally took out the Celta striker in a tough encounter. It is obvious that with the foul on the penalty, which was then implemented by the super-experienced Alonso with a shot in the lower right corner.

Did Real need this overtime after the Super Bowl loss? Obviously not. Celty didn’t need him either, but Claudio Heraldez’s team would not have gladly given up the penalty shootout under such a scenario of events, but for this it was necessary to play all 30+ additional minutes with quality, and not half of this time, as the guests did.

As a result, we have a rout from Real in the second overtime with three goals from Endrik (double) and Valverde. The last, in general, put another luxurious long-range shot into the upper left corner, while the Brazilian first also from the edge of the penalty area on the right flank hit the other goal from a pass by Güler, and then completed the cross from the Turk from a corner on the right flank with the fifth. I wonder if anyone will now remember that unmarked penalty named after Lunin?

Real Madrid will play their next match in La Liga at home against Las Palmas, and Celta will host Basque Athletic.

Real — Celta 5:2
Goals: Mbappe, 37, Vinicius, 48, Endrik, 108, 119, Valverde, 112 — Bamba, 83, Alonso, 90+1 (pen.)

Real: Lunin — L. Vasquez, Asensio, Rudiger, F. Garcia (Bellingham, 90+2) — Chuameni, Modric (Valverde, 79) — Diaz (Güler, 70), Ceballos (Kamavinga, 70), Vinicius (Rodrigo, 106) — Mbappe (Andric, 79).

Celta: Villar — Mingesa, Kh. Rodriguez (Manquillo, 95), Starfelt, Alonso — Carreira (Servi, 75), Moriba, Beltran (Sotelo, 57), Alvarez (Bamba, 66) — Swedberg (Duran, 56), Iglesias (Lopez, 75).

Warning: Asensio, Endrik – Villar, Starfelt, Alonso, Iglesias