Spanish Segunda Division match review - CD Tenerife versus UD Salamanca
The newly demoted Spanish club Tenerife played their second Liga Adelante match against UD Salamanca at the Estadio Heliodoro Rodríguez López in Canary Islands, Spain. Tenerife got relegated from Spanish football’s top division i.e. La Liga after their abysmal 2009-2010 season, where they only managed to finish at the 19thplaced spot.
On the other hand, their opponents on the night finished at the 16th place in second division of Spanish football in the 2009-2010 season. In doing so, Salamanca barely managed to earn themselves another season of Segunda division football. Both the teams played some attacking football in the 2009-2010, therefore fans turned up at the Heliodoro Rodriguez Stadium with an expectation of a thrilling match.
Tenerife played with only a single striker up top and went with five midfielders in the center of the park. At the back for the club from Canary Islands, their manager opted for four defenders in an attempt to keep a clean sheet. Conversely, Salamanca approached the match in a optimistic fashion with two strikers upfront and four midfielders. However, their midfield was not in a conventional shape but a diamond one, as their coach went for an attacking midfielder along with two wingers and a defensive midfielder to provide cover for their back four.
All eyes were on Tenerife’s striker Nino who managed to score fourteen goals in last season’s La Liga campaign for the Los blanquiazules. It was anticipated that he would at least get one goal against Salamanca’s fragile defense. The game started off slowly as both the teams were on the defensive for the first fifteen minutes. Both sets of players were trying to feel their way into the game as it was only their second competitive match of the season so far.
Tenerife soon gained the edge by controlling a larger part of the possession through their midfield five. Salamanca were outnumbered in the midfield area and therefore found it hard to influence the match in any sort of way. Tenerife soon found the net with Natalio Poquet’s incredible shot from outside the box in the 32nd minute of the match. The Spanish striker who is known for his proficiency inside the penalty area surprised everyone with his striker which gave Tenerife the lead as the score was turned to one zero in favor of Tenerife.
Tenerife found confidence through their goal and went on to dominate the rest of the half. In the dying moments of the first half, they had another chance to make it two zero but Ricardo León failed to convert David Prieto’s pass into a goal. At the half time whistle, the score lay at one nil to Tenerife. After the second half started, Tenerife looked off the pace as Salamanca soon played themselves back into the game. Following a good run of play, Salamanca found the back of the net with their equalizing goal in the 56th minute of the match through Jose Moraton’s from Brian Sarmiento’s cross. This generated confusion and frustration in Tenerife’s ranks as they had already taken their lead for granted.
Jose’s goal brought the score line to one all as everything was up for grabs once again. In an attempt to gain control of the ball in the 71st minute of the match, David Prieto committed a dangerous tackle for which the referee sent the Sevilla man off. Prieto had been signed on loan from Sevilla by Tenerife before the start of the 2010-2011 Segunda Division season. David’s red card meant that Tenerife had to play the rest of the match with ten men against Salamanca’s eleven.
This proved to be too much for the handicapped team as the match was set for a monumental finish. In the 89th minute of the match, Salamanca grabbed their winner with Lopez k**e’s finish from inside the Tenerife’s penalty area. Two minutes of injury time was played after Lopez’s goal and the match finally ended in a defeat for Tenerife as the final score was 1-2 to Salamanca.
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