Nico Serrano profane Vallecas – AS.com

Every beginning has an end. Nico Serrano — Lezama’s cub and budding talent — desecrated Vallecas, ending the immaculate streak of Rayo de Iraola, who had remained undefeated at home all season (ten days). Athletic did not suffer from fatigue or casualties and rounded off its fantastic week, achieving what Barça or Betis had not been able to do so far, making the red-haired team bite the dust. The people of Madrid were not the gale of blows and occasions of other combats, merit of some lions that are lethal at home, to the point of having only lost at the Bernabéu.

Vallecas received his particular villain with whistles, Marcelino, the current coach of Athletic and one of the triggers for that red-and-red descent from 15-16. There are wounds that, even healed, continue to bother. To shake off that past, nothing better than looking at the present. It only took Rayo eight seconds to show his rival what it means to enter his domain. Falcao drew a Vaseline, which was lost a few centimeters above the crossbar. From then on, the local effect dissipated and the lions unfolded their plan, looking for long balls to Iñaki Williams and Raúl García and strategic plays —one of their strengths— to try to intimidate Luca. Nevertheless, Berenguer had the first warning of live fire on his left foot and his shot, from the top of the area, went slightly off target.

The game had a hard time stretching out, but he did it in a heart-stopping move. The ball wandered into the area of ​​the Basque team on a couple of occasions without finding a finisher in the ranks of Rayo. It was the prelude that something was about to happen. A loss by Comesaña led to an Athletic counterattack that ended with a cross by Raúl García, from the right flank, towards Berenguer, his Chilean attempt was unsuccessful, but Nico Serrano’s volley did, who opened the scoring half an hour into the game and scored his first goal as a professional. It was his first tenure and he got his doctorate in Vallecas, where giving up is prohibited. Álvaro, on the way back, took a shot out of his hat that died in Unai’s mitts and, immediately afterwards, Luca also cleared a whiplash from Williams. Moments before the break, the controversy appeared. The people of Madrid claimed a possible penalty at the hand of Vivian.

The second half began with visiting dominance. Nico Serrano caressed the double, when he sent up a shot that Lekue had put behind him. The script did not change much with the passing of the minutes. The red-haired ones had a hard time finding the cracks to sneak through and they almost always opened on the side of the Garcia. If they suffered in front, behind too. Rayo saw how Athletic insisted on the counter attack testing Luca, with a cross shot from Raúl García and a header from Dani García that was too high. Iraola’s men recovered their pulse when Álvaro appeared in a pure state, pulling speed, cutting Unai and forcing Íñigo Martínez to sprint and crash into the post to abort the draw. Of course, the play was invalidated for offside.

The Basque defense repelled the attacks of Fran García and Balliu. El Rayo was looking more like the usual version, pushed by the stands. With ten minutes to go nothing seemed decided. The redheads shot everything, with more heart than head, with the primary drive to resist defeat, getting closer and closer. Unai put the mitt to deflect a shot from Baby and the siege continued with a rain of crosses to the area and corners. Water. This time there was no happy ending in Vallecas, although His Rayo (just like Athletic now) continues to be one point behind European positions.