Mbappe booed on Real Madrid return
A lovely Jude Bellingham solo effort ensured Real Madrid returned to winning ways with a 2-0 victory over Real Oviedo in LaLiga.
Madrid has come under fire this week after its trophy-less season was confirmed by Barcelona last weekend, but it bounced back from their Clasico defeat by scoring late in each half.
Los Blancos made a slow start, but still could have led early on with Franco Mastantuono and Brahim Diaz forcing an early double save out of Aaron Escandell.
Trent Alexander-Arnold sent an effort swerving wide shortly after, while Nacho Vidal almost gave already-relegated Oviedo a shock lead, only to blaze over.
But Gonzalo Garcia broke the deadlock on the stroke of half-time; under pressure, he took his shot quickly from the edge of the box, drilling his low effort into the bottom-right corner.
Santi Cazorla – who entered the pitch to a stadium-wide ovation at the Bernabeu – almost made an immediate impact when he picked out Alberto Reina, who could not hit the target.
However, Madrid made sure of the points in the 80th minute. The returning Kylian Mbappe – who was jeered after being substituted on – laid the ball off to Bellingham, who skipped away from two defenders to beat Escandell with a low strike.
Haissem Hassan forced a sharp save out of Thibaut Courtois before Mbappe curled wide at the other end with the last kick of the game, but there were no more goals in the Spanish capital.
While the substitute pairing of Bellingham and Mbappe will steal some of the headlines, Garcia was the one who got the ball rolling at a tense Bernabeu.
Converting 33.3 percent of his shots (excluding those blocked), Garcia has the best success rate among the 17 Madrid goalscorers this season in all competitions (11 goals).
Only Julian Ryerson from Borussia Dortmund and Luis Milla from Getafe have provided more assists, without scoring a single goal, in the five major European leagues this season than Diaz (six, level with Yukinari Sugawara from Werder Bremen).
