FOOTBALL: Roundup of yesterday’s games across Europe

Emmanuel Alfred

Korean Guy inflicts City’s first defeat. Bellingham and Kane lead golden boot Convo and Havertz finally scores

Villa roasts Brighton

In Nigeria we say, “Omo” when something surprising happens that we never saw coming.
Aston Villa delivered a 6-1 whitewash of Brighton and Hove Albion in the Premier League yesterday with striker, Ollie Watkins grabbing a hattrick – his first in 3 years.
An own goal from Estupinan, Jacob Ramsey and Douglas Luiz completed a memorable afternoon for Unai Emery’s side as Ansu Fati scored his first goal for Brighton.

The Korean Guy jogs Pep’s memory

When mentioning attackers of Wolverhampton Wanderers, Manchester City boss, Pep Guadiola forgot Hwang Hee-Chan’s name and called him, “The Korean Guy”.
Well, he scored the winner in the game between that saw City lose their 100% winning record this season and their first Premier League game since February
I’m sure he will remember his name now.

United lose back to back Premier League games

7 games, 4 defeats, 3 wins, 7 goals scored and 11 conceded. Manchester United are a really struggling.
The latest episode was a deafeat to Crystal Palace at Old Trafford where Anderson scored an absolute stunner from the set piece delivery.
This is their worst start to a season in 34 years and it seems Eric Ten Haag has a lot of work to do to turn this around.

Gunners fires 4 past Cherries

Kai Havertz scored his first goal since joining Arsenal from Chelsea in the Gunners’ 4- 0 thumping of Bournemouth at the Vitality Stadium.

The German who had been criticized for not adding value to the team scored from one of the penalties .

Bukayo Saka scordd first from the rebound from Gabriel Jesus’ effort and captain Martin Odegaard made it 2-0 before halftime from the penalty.

Havertz then scored and Ben White made sure of a comprehensive performance after he headed home from Odegaard’s free-kick in added time.

Newcastle best Burnley at Tyneside

Miguel Almiron scored a stunning opener as Newcastle United beat Burnley FC 2-0 in the Premier League.
Almiron’s long range effort hit the top corner of the post to put Eddie Howe’s side ahead in the first half.

Alexander Isak confirmed the victory close to the end as he converted from the spotkick after Anthony Gordon was brought down in the penalty box.

The Magpies could have had more but were guilty of wastefulness infront of goal and that means they have won three Premier League matches in a row.

Tottenham edge Liverpool in a very controversial game

Two red cards and a controversial VAR decision characterized the victory of Tottenham Hotspur against Liverpool yesterday.

The first red was for midfielder, Curtis Jones for a foul on Spurs midfielder, Yves Bissouma after 26 minutes following a VAR check.

The second was for Diogo Jota who was sent off for double yellow cards with more than 20 minutes remaining.

Luis Diaz’ goal was controversially ruled out for offside as the officials did that without showing the customary offside line graphics.

Professional Game Match Officials Limited(PGMOL) has come out to issue a statement admitting that a “significant human error” took place, calling the decision to rule out Diaz’s goal “a clear and obvious factual error”.

Captain Son Heung-min put Spurs in front 9 minutes from halftime but the Reds equalized through Cody Gakpo who ended up injuring himself in the process.

Liverpool goalkeeper, Alisson Becker was huge in keeping the scoreline level kept with outstanding saves from Maddison and Son, before Joel Matip turned Pedro Porro’s cross into his own net and give Liverpool their first deafeat of the season

The controversy in the game has seen Darren England being replaced as the fourth official for Sunday’s Premier League game between Nottingham Forest and Brentford.

Bellingham continues form

Jude Bellingham and Joselu produced a goal and an assist each as Real Madrid defeated surprised league leaders Girona FC 0-3 to go top of the pile.

Joselu scored first after a fabulous pass from Bellingham before French midfielder Aurelien Tchouameni scored a header to double the visitors’ advantage.

Bellingham completed the scoring with a smart second-half finish and take his tally to 6 LA Liga goals this season.

Ramos gifts Barca win

Former Real Madrid defender Sergio Ramos scored an own goal to give Barcelona a 1-0 win on Friday.

In a very tight game when the chances were few and far between, it was the former Spanish captain who decided the game to take the defending champions to second

Bundesliga: Bayern drops point as Leverkusen goes top

Bayer Leverkusen are top of the summit in the Bundesliga after crushing Mainz 3-0 on Saturday.

Mainz defender Sepp van den Berg turned the ball into his own net to give Xabi Alonso’s side the lead before Alejandro Grimaldo doubled Leverkusen’s lead with a too quality free-kick and German winger Jonas Hofmann made it three to cap a comfortable afternoon.

Mainz are bottom of the table after having just one point in six matches.

Elsewhere, Bayern came from two goals down to get a draw against RB Leipzig.

Leipzig striker Lois Openda scored first after beating Bayern goalkeeper, Sven Ulreich and slotting the ball into the net.

The second came after Castello Lukeba scored from the rebound. England forward Harry Kane scored his 8th goal in 6 league games from the spot-kick into the bottom corner before parity was restored as Leroy Sane broke through on the counter-attack and finished devastatingly.

Both goalkeepers were immense by pulling great saves to see the game end 2-2 and take Bayern to third place; two points behind leaders, Leverkusen and one point behind Stuttgart.

Serie A: Martinez produced a devastating performance and Napoli win

Lautaro Martinez produced one of the greatest performances by a substitute as he came from bench to score all four goals in Inter’s 4-0 drubbing of Salernitana to go back to the top of Serie A.

All four goals including a penalty came in 27 minutes.
Marcus Thuram’s low cross met the Argentine who converted expertly to put Inter ahead. He then made it 2 after 77 minutes when he confidently finished a pass from Nicolò Barella with a first-time strike.

He got his hattrick from the spot kick after Thurman was pulled down inside the box and then got the quadruple from a header.

Noah Okafor and Christian Pulisic both scored to give AC Milan a two nil victory over Lazio yesterday.

Rafael Leao was in the thick of things as he assisted Pulisic for his third goal of the season since joining from Chelsea.

The Portuguese provided another assist to Okafor who made it 2-0 for the Milan side. Both Inter and Milan are level on points but Inter top with goal difference.

Elsewhere, Napoli produced a commanding performance at the Stadio Via Del Mare with a 4-0 win against Lecce.

The defending champions who have been on the radar after a controversial video of Victor Osimhen appeared on their official TikTok account were ruthless yesterday.

Osimhen came from the bench to make it 2-0 after Leo Ostigard had put them ahead from the corner kick.

Khvicha Kvaratskhelia’s delicious cross met the Nigerian after a swift counter attack. Gianluca Gaetano scored from the edge of the vox before Matteo Politano made it 4 and take Napoli up to third on the log.

Ligue 1: Monaco goes top

AS Monaco midfielder Maghnes Akliouche got a brace and Folarin Balogun got the other as they came from twice from behind to beat Marseille 3-2 to move top of Ligue 1.

Marseille, who have a new manager in Gennaro Gattuso after appointing him earlier in the week, took the lead after 30 seconds through Iliman Ndiaye’s goal, but the hosts responded almost immediately when Akliouche fired a low shot past Pau López.

Marseille scored the second through Samuel Gigot but the home side rallied again to equalize courtesy of Balogun before the win was sealed by Akliouche.