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Sports, Football

Minnows Alcoyano stun Real


Bangladeshpost
Published : 21 Jan 2021 09:27 PM

Reuters, Alcoy

Real Madrid suffered a shock 2-1 defeat to lowly Alcoyano on Wednesday to exit the Copa del Rey, as the third division side scored an unlikely winner late in extra time after being reduced to 10 men.

Eder Militao headed in a cross from Brazilian compatriot Marcelo to give Real the lead right at the end of the first half, but Alcoyano substitute Jose Solbes stabbed home following a corner to level for the hosts with 10 minutes remaining.

Alcoyano's Ramon Lopez picked up a second yellow card in the 110th minute for a foul on Casemiro to leave his side a man down, but instead of clinging on for penalties, the home side burst forward five minutes later and snatched a winner when midfielder Juanan turned in a cross from close range.

"You should always dream big, we worked our socks off and suffered a lot," said Alcoyano goalkeeper Jose Juan.

Real coach Zinedine Zidane added: "It's a difficult moment because we're out of the Cup, we needed to do more than we did today but at least we tried everything."

Zidane made nine changes to the team that were beaten 2-1 by Athletic Bilbao in last week's Spanish Super Cup semi-final but was still able to field a strong starting 11 containing five Champions League winners.

He then brought on his star players such as Karim Benzema, Toni Kroos and Eden Hazard but Real's Galacticos were out-gunned by the semi-professional side, who have a total budget of 700,000 euros, less than many Real players earn each month.

"They pulled out all their weapons but we played so well, it's made me emotional. Something like this doesn't happen very often in life," added Jose Juan.