Girona's goal of fighting to play in the Champions League next year is beginning to become small. After certifying the permanence in record time and having made the Europa League know little about anything right now, Míchel's men want to continue looking upwards and more after defeating Atlético in a spectacular match full of goals (4-3 ). Morata, with a hat-trick, kept the colchoneros alive against a Girona team that always led the score thanks to the goals from Valery, Savinho and Blind in the first half and Iván Martín in added time, breaking the tie and leaving the three points in Montilivi.
And things did not start very well for the locals, who were finally left without being able to field any of the two players who were a doubt, Tsygankov and Yangel Herrera. Neither of them could recover from their physical problems in time, but despite these setbacks the locals moved forward again. This time the Madrid coach opted again for Pablo Torre and Valery, the only novelty compared to the Betis game, playing close to the wing.
In the Colchonero team, the main unknown was knowing who would occupy the right lane and Rodrigo Riquelme was the chosen one, upon returning to Montilivi where he played on loan last season for Atlético.
The game was crazy from the start. Only 32 seconds had been played and Dobvyk had a clear chance, finishing off Savinho's right-wing cross. But a few moments later, after two minutes, Valery, from the other lane, caught a ball in front of him to face Witsel with all the daring in the world and send a very placed thread, far from Oblak's reach. Míchel had once again been right with the choice of the L'Escala footballer.
But the Madrid team, far from blaming this early goal, overcame it by launching into the attack, with the mobility of Griezmann and Morata making the Girona defense go headlong. So much so that the tying goal did not take long to arrive and just before the quarter-hour mark Morata collected control from the French striker with his head to cross perfectly against Gazzaniga. Initially Hernández Hernández invalidated the play due to offside, but with the VAR review he ended up granting it.
The match did not let up and was of such intensity that a mistake at any moment could be fatal. So it was. When half an hour had not yet been reached, an error in the construction phase by the Madrid team, partly thanks to the high pressure of Iván Martín, allowed the Bilbao midfielder to recover the ball, shoot against Oblak and Savinho collect the rebound to get back ahead of your team.
The reaction of Simeone's team at that moment was to make the game harder, but Girona responded to the fouls with more football. Pablo Torre, clearly from less to more and probably completing his best performance since he arrived at Montilivi, invented a millimeter pass that almost served to give Yan Couto the goal, but again Oblak saved by sending a corner. And it was in the subsequent play, in which a cross from Aleix Garcia, extended with Dobvyk's back turned into an excellent assist at the far post for Blind, arriving from the second line, to score the third.
Montilivi didn't believe it but the party didn't last long and, again, because of Morata. The Colchonero forward gained the back of the defense after a very good pass from De Paul from his own half and beat Gazzaniga to make it 3-2. A Morata who, on the brink of half-time, still had the opportunity to tie the game again and score his third goal, but at the time he received the ball he was in an illegal position.
He did achieve it, however, right after the restart, in which Simeone's men came out better on the pitch. After another good action by De Paul, who advanced meters as he wanted with the ball at his feet, Morata once again finished perfectly to tie the score at three. Fortunately for the locals, the striker did not have a clearer chance and ended up being substituted in the final stretch of the game in which when everyone seemed to sign the tie and Girona was running short of fuel than ever, Iván Martín put on the cape as a hero and, completely alone in attack, he made a space between four rival defenses to send a shot to the squad that ended up giving the victory to the people from Girona in added time in the face of collective delirium.
