{"id":15734,"date":"2023-10-01T15:43:38","date_gmt":"2023-10-01T15:43:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/?p=15734"},"modified":"2023-10-01T15:43:38","modified_gmt":"2023-10-01T15:43:38","slug":"la-liga-bellingham-delivers-again-as-real-madrid-teach-girona-lesson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/?p=15734","title":{"rendered":"La Liga: Bellingham Delivers Again As Real Madrid Teach Girona Lesson"},"content":{"rendered":"

Agency Report<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Inspired by Jude Bellingham, Real Madrid showed both steel and class to beat high-flying Girona 3-0 on Saturday and move back top of La Liga.<\/span><\/p>\n

Girona headed into the weekend as unlikely leaders but champions Barcelona usurped them by beating Sevilla on Friday, with Real then deposing their rivals at the league\u2019s summit with a solid triumph on Catalan soil.<\/span><\/p>\n

Joselu and Aurelien Tchouameni\u2019s first-half goals were enough to burst Girona\u2019s bubble and after that the record 35-time La Liga winners kept the plucky upstarts at arm\u2019s length.<\/span><\/p>\n

The stylish Bellingham netted with 20 minutes remaining to seal Madrid\u2019s victory and continue his own sparkling run of goalscoring form.<\/span><\/p>\n

Madrid defender Nacho was sent off late in the match for an ugly high tackle on Portu, who went off injured.<\/span><\/p>\n

Michel\u2019s side beat Real Madrid 4-2 at home last season and their fans believed they could repeat the trick, but they found a determined side in their path.<\/span><\/p>\n

In only their fourth season in the Spanish top flight and unbeaten in their first seven games, the City Football Group owned side are flourishing, but their illustrious visitors arrived with a point to prove about the natural order of things, and snapped that run.<\/span><\/p>\n

Madrid coach Carlo Ancelotti brought in Eduardo Camavinga at left-back to bolster the defence after Atletico Madrid found too much joy down the flanks in Los Blancos\u2019 derby defeat last weekend.<\/span><\/p>\n

The coach also handed Vinicius Junior his first start after injury, following his cameo in the win over Las Palmas on Wednesday.<\/span><\/p>\n

Girona came out with their tails up, looking to capitalise on the boisterous home atmosphere at their small but fired-up Montilivi stadium.<\/span><\/p>\n

They almost did, with Yangel Herrera heading narrowly over and Viktor Tsygankov hitting the post in an early onslaught inside the opening five minutes.<\/span><\/p>\n

However Madrid took the lead against the run of play to stop the hosts in their tracks.<\/span><\/p>\n

Joselu converted from close range after Bellingham found the Spain striker with a sublime outside-of-the-boot cross.<\/span><\/p>\n

The on-loan forward\u2019s effort was straight at goalkeeper Paulo Gazzaniga, but he did not have the reflexes to keep it out.<\/span><\/p>\n

Four minutes later the visitors netted their second, with Aurelien Tchouameni given a free header from Toni Kroos\u2019 corner, gratefully accepting his first goal for Madrid since joining in 2022.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bellingham was not so clinical when played in on goal, with Gazzaniga denying him well and then tipping over a Kroos volley.<\/span><\/p>\n

AFP<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Inspired by Jude Bellingham, Real Madrid showed both steel and class to beat high-flying Girona 3-0 on Saturday and move back top of La Liga.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15735,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7716,7125,586,58],"class_list":["post-15734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-girona","tag-jude-bellingham","tag-la-liga","tag-real-madrid"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15734"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15734"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15734\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15736,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15734\/revisions\/15736"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}