The confrontation between Sporting CP and Arsenal on Tuesday evening, in the quarter-final of the Champions League, was not an exciting encounter. Both teams showed that they had perfect control of their defense. However, Sporting defender Ousmane Diomande managed to get the crowd to their feet with an extraordinary pass.
Everyone knows that Arsenal’s defense is often well organized and difficult to beat. Les Gunners are the team that has conceded the fewest goals in the league and, in the Champions League too, Mikel Arteta’s side have conceded just five goals.
However, Diomande, the Ivory Coast international, managed to completely surprise the London defense from the first minutes. The central defender managed to create a scoring opportunity from a seemingly impossible situation.
The Ivorian received the ball near the center circle and saw left-back Maxi Araújo make a nice deep run. With a trivela – a pass from the outside of the foot, signature of Ricardo Quaresma – the defender managed to put the Uruguayan alone against David Raya and completely surprise right-back Ben White.
Araújo then found himself alone against the Spanish goalkeeper and aimed his shot perfectly. However, Raya, as often this season, was able to distinguish himself by diverting the ball with his fingertips onto the crossbar. Thus, the Ivorian’s incomparable pass suffered a fate it did not deserve.
This magnificent pass was unfortunately not the harbinger of the rest of the match, marked mainly by a solid and well organized defense, which prevented the creation of clear chances.
For a long time, it looked like the match was going to end in a draw and without relief, until substitute Kai Havertz, in the final minutes, transformed a nice pass from another substitute, Gabriel Martinelli, into a goal: 0-1.
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