"The clock in Santiago Bernabeu showed 98min 40sec when Pedri picked up the ball on the edge of his area and went on the final run of an exhausting afternoon. Here perhaps was one last chance to get something, the Barcelona midfielder somehow hauling himself up the pitch; instead, as he reached the other area, a tired, loose touch, a desperate lunge to get it back, saw him take out Aurelien Tchouameni the world upside down and get sent off."
"There was plenty of that, players squaring then and again when the whistle at last went a few seconds later, Thibaut Courtois and Lamine Yamal, Vinicius Junior and Raphinha, who wasn't even playing, confronting each other. But it was Madrid who celebrated. They had gone at it for over an hour then just about controlled it. The fixture that never lets you down, the game with only one 0-0 draw in more than 50 meetings,"
"The difference now, 20 minutes into a wild, intense and noisy first half, was that the celebrations were not cut short by the video assistant referee. They had been playing just a minute and 57 seconds when Cesar Soto Grado pointed to the spot only to be called to the screen where eventually he saw that it had in fact been Vinicius Junior, running into the area and swiping at a shot, who had made contact with Lamine Yamal, not the other way round."
The match lasted 105 minutes and produced 38 shots, three goals, and several contentious decisions. Kylian Mbappe and Jude Bellingham scored first-half goals for Real Madrid; Fermin Lopez scored for Barcelona but that proved insufficient. A penalty initially awarded was overturned by the video assistant referee after review determined Vinicius Junior made contact with Lamine Yamal. Pedri was sent off late after a desperate lunge on Aurelien Tchouameni. Players confronted each other at the final whistle, but Real Madrid celebrated a 2-1 victory, ending a sequence of clasicos and controlling large portions of the game.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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