Sporting get the job done at Sabadell’s expense

R. Sporting’s win over CE Sabadell embodied the joy and misery of the second last matchday of the Liga Adelante season. The 2-0 result means the Asturians remain in third place which, depending on how Girona FC get on next week, could see them clinch automatic promotion to the Liga BBVA or at the very least a playoff spot, but it also acted as the final nail in the coffin for Juan Carlos Mandiá’s charges.

With everything on the line on the penultimate matchday of the season, both sides were well aware what was at stake. The Catalans threatened first with two goalscoring opportunities during the early stages of the game, which Iván 'Pichu' Cuéllar was able to deal with easily. However, as the minutes ticked by, it was Abelardo Fernández’s men who began to control the encounter, which ultimately led to them taking a two-goal lead in the space of just seventh minutes. First through a bit of opportunism from Carlos Castro, and then thanks to a great bit of play from Hugo Fraile that Nacho Cases cooly finished off.

The 2-0 scoreline at the halftime break meant Gijón sat in third place while Sabadell found themselves in the drop zone. Things followed a similar pattern after the restart for the Catalans who, to add to their misery, were forced to contend with an injury to Anibal Zurdo. Sporting made the most of their opponents’ misfortune to carve out more chances and further suffocate the visitors who, with this defeat, will now have to wait at the very least one season in order to play Liga Adelante football again.