Espanyol falls apart against the bottom team despite playing with one more

Cornellà de LlobregatThe first half at Butarque did not serve as a warning to Espanyol, who last night lost heavily once again (1-3). This time as the home team, against the bottom side of the League and with an extra player from practically the beginning of the match. The passivity and inability against an Elche side that had not yet won in the League sparked whistles at Cornellà-El Prat and leaves Manolo González very shaken, who, despite having seven points, faces a long international break after two defeats that hurt a lot, especially due to the worrying image of his team.

Bryan Zaragoza, the big new addition to the Galician coach's starting eleven, started for the first time in the white and blue jersey. He made his presence felt immediately: just in the fifth minute, he stole a ball at the edge of the rival area and provoked a red card for Federico Redondo, following the referee's consultation with VAR. The son of the former Madrid footballer grabbed the Andalusian by the shirt after an unforgivable loss of possession, committing a double error that could have greatly conditioned the match. But it did not.

Espanyol stumbles over the same stone

Despite playing with an extra man, Espanyol struggled a lot to impose their pace on the game; so much so that Elche took the lead on the scoreboard. Fer Niño, after receiving a long pass from Revivo, took advantage of a false exit by Marko Dmitrovic to make it 0-1. It was the 25th minute and the white-and-blues had not even shot on goal. Not only that, three minutes later, the same Fer Niño scored the second, firing past the Serbian goalkeeper while the Catalan defense watched. Espanyol did not learn the lesson against Rayo Vallecano.

Neither the second goal nor the whistles at the RCDE Stadium woke up the blue-and-whites, imprecise and unable to assert their superiority and cause damage in static play against the bottom team of the League. Like on Tuesday, Espanyol went into the break trailing 0-2 and with the feeling that a miracle would be needed to turn it around. No sign of Roberto Fernández or Javi Hernández, called up to the senior and under-21 Spanish national teams, who have been sensations in the 'periquito' start to the season. Only Bryan Zaragoza, still lacking rhythm, troubled Dituro's goal with a practically harmless long-range shot.

At halftime, Manolo brought on Hartmann and Marcos Fernández to try to fix the disaster of the first half. Not even that worked. In fact, it was Elche that was close to scoring: Cepeda crashed against Dmitrovic's post after a great counterattack by the visitors. The minutes were ticking away and the reaction did not come. The Catalan side could not find a way to penetrate the goal of the team that has conceded the most in the First Division, which was on its way to keeping a clean sheet for the first time this season.

But Espanyol avoided that 20 minutes from the end, with a cross from Javi Hernández that Víctor Chust turned into his own net. A mirage, because shortly after Valera caught a counterattack to definitively sink the 'periquitos', who said goodbye to jeers and will experience an international break that will be anything but peaceful.