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On Sunday, in the 13th round of the Spanish championship, the former leader of the championship, "Sevilla", unexpectedly suffered a defeat, losing 2-1 to "Espanyol" in Barcelona. Real Madrid quickly took advantage of this, defeating Athletic Bilbao 2-1 at home and rising to second place, reducing the gap from the leader Barcelona to just one point.
Led by their new head coach Mane, Athletic Bilbao's footballers took the lead in the match in Madrid when Luis Prieto's penalty shot from Igor Gabilondo flew into Iker Casillas's goal. However, in the second half, after a long pass from Sergio Ramos, Ronaldo equalized, and with about fifteen minutes left to play, the visitors were left with ten men as striker Aritzas Aduriz was sent off.
With less than ten minutes left in the match, veteran Roberto Carlos scored the winning goal with a shot from outside the penalty area.
Sevilla dropped to third place in the league table after losing to Espanyol away. Although Sevilla's footballers took the lead with a successful penalty kick by Frederic Kanoute in the middle of the first half, earned by Adriano Correia, former Spanish national team striker Raul Tamudo equalized after racing against Andres Palop alone, and with ten minutes left to play, striker Luis Garcia scored a second goal for Espanyol after receiving a pass from Ivan de la Pena from the corner, defeating the Sevilla goalkeeper for the second time.
Even though Espanyol was left with ten men after midfielder Albert Riera saw a red card, Sevilla failed to secure at least a draw.
Red cards were shown in a fiery match in La Coruna, where Deportivo and Racing Santander played, with three red cards shown in total. In the beginning of the second half, the visitors were reduced to ten men when Pedro Munitis was sent off. With a little over ten minutes left to play, tall striker Nikola Zigic had to leave the field, and in added time, the hosts lost Cristiano.
Real Sociedad's footballers continued to miss out on victories this year. The San Sebastian team played 0-0 at home against Getafe from Madrid, who are in seventh place in the league.
Villarreal leveled the points with Getafe, gradually finding their game again and this time defeating the outsider, Gimnastic from Tarragona, 2-0.
In the last match of the 13th round played late on Sunday evening, another unexpected result was recorded: almost all match, the home team, Zaragoza, who had been leading, conceded two goals in the last ten minutes and had to admit the superiority of Osasuna from Pamplona with a score of 1-2.
The hosts took the lead when the team's top scorer, Argentine Diego Milito, scored after great play by Carlos Diogo and Sergio Garcia. Although Zaragoza dominated almost the entire match, in the 81st minute, Raul Garcia equalized with a header from a corner, and in added time, during a counterattack, the ball was directed into his own net by Argentine Leonardo Ponzio after a pass from David Lopez from the wing.
Statistics
Deportivo La Coruna 0 - 0 Racing Santander
51' Pedro Munitis sent off (Racing Santander)
79' Nikola Zigic sent off (Racing Santander)
90' Cristian sent off (Deportivo)
Espanyol Barcelona 2 - 1 Sevilla
25' [0 - 1] Frederic Kanoute (pen.)
68' [1 - 1] Raul Tamudo
79' [2 - 1] Luis Garcia
84' Albert Riera sent off (Espanyol)
... (the rest of the match results are listed in the text)
