Sabadel beat Oviedo 3-1 in Segunda División's sixth round at Nova Creu Alta on Sunday. The hosts climbed to sixth place with six wins, three draws and one defeat, while the visitors sat on eight points after two wins, two draws and two losses. And here's the thing — it is not the three goals that stay with you, but what happened before the first one.
Gastón Joaquín Valles Velázquez opened the scoring in the twenty-third minute, and that was the moment the game turned. Óscar Sanz doubled the lead just before half-time, and Oviedo had to change three players at the break. Aisar Ahmed, Alexandru Mihai Isfan and Youness Lachhab Didi came on, and to be fair it looked like a panic move rather than a tactical shift.
Alberto Reina pulled one back in the sixty-seventh minute, and for a while it felt like Oviedo might claw their way back. Ton Ripoll picked up a yellow card just after, and Sabadel responded with four substitutions in quick succession. Ángel Baena wrapped it up in the seventy-eighth minute, and the rest was management. By then the result was already decided, and the yellow cards bought time rather than changed anything.
The statistics tell the same story. Sabadel created three big chances against Oviedo's one, and their expected goals of 1.55 versus 0.45 showed who was really threatening. The visitors had more possession — 59 per cent — but only two shots on target from fourteen attempts. Sabadel hit seven shots on target from fourteen, and their shots accuracy of 44 per cent meant they did not waste what they had.
Six points separate the two sides now, and that gap matters more than the table position. Sabadel sit sixth with eleven points after six games, while Oviedo are thirteenth with eight. The home side lost their last match 2-0 to Mallorca, but this result puts them back in the conversation. Oviedo's run of draws and narrow defeats has ended, but not in the way they wanted.
