Betis and Granada tied 2-2 a party in which three of the goals came in a stretch in which Roberto Soldado, in added time, made the comeback of the Verdiblancos sterile, thus remaining doubts about the future of the local coach, Joan Francesc Ferrer ‘Rubi’.
The 2-2 leaves Betis with very few options to fight for Europe and stops Granada in those same aspirations after a crash in which Carlos Fernández overtook Granada in the first half, although in the final section, Canales, from a penalty, and Tello turned the game around until Soldado returned the tables to the scoreboard.
In the first closed-door game in the Villamarin, without the encouragement for the locals of its more than 50,000 members, two teams measured each other in opposite situations, with Betis forced to compensate for their painful image against Sevilla (2-0) and their coach Ruby very questioned, and Granada on the rise and dreaming of European positions.
Questioned by the ridicule made in the Sánchez Pizjuán, where his team never competed after three months of hiatus, Joan Francesc Ferrer ‘Rubi’ revolutionized his eleven with up to seven changes (Pedraza, Mandi and Feddal behind, the media Guardado and Édgar and Joaquín and Loren above) for the ‘victims’ of the derby, against a Granada with sensible losses in the midfield, without Gonalons or the Venezuelan Herrera.
The appointment, crucial for the future of the Catalan coach and for the distant greenish options to fight for Europe, began with those of Diego Martínez very serious and pressing up, demonstrating his condition as a solid and very ordered rival, against a Betic team that sought the bands, but without too much clarity or speed.
The rojiblancos, with a recomposed very powerful midfield with the Cameroonian Yan Eteki and the Nigerian Ramón Azeez, were the first to approach the goal with a strong shot with the right and from the front of the area of Antonio Puertas, who returned after his sanction, but Joel Robles deflected it without problems after 9 minutes.
The good pressure of Granada, a super-disciplined team and in which everyone works, clouded the ideas of Betis, who did not know how to dismantle the organized system of Diego Martínez’s team and only created a couple of actions of real danger.
Édgar González tried his head in the 27th minute after a corner, but it was the people of Granada, faster in their lines of attack and by taking advantage of turnovers from the locals, who hit first with a goal from Carlos Fernández , loaned in Granada by Sevilla, within half an hour.
The Sevilla player, the architect of the comeback against Getafe (2-1), proved to be on a streak by going 0-1 after a pass behind Antonio Puertas after a counter shot by Azeez, who took advantage of a lost ball by Joaquín in a horizontal pass.
From there, the green and white, without the proper rhythm and gripped, trapped in their own helplessness, sought to react, but lacked the determination and depth necessary to equalize the clash, the Portuguese goalkeeper Rui Silva preventing it without too much trouble distant shots of Loren and the Frenchman Nabil Fekir.
On the resume, the script hardly changed. The grenadinistas followed their own, squeezing a beet midfield without spark and which took a world to generate danger before the visiting area.
This facilitated the work in defense of Granada, which defended its income and almost did not project in attack in this second half, to stop the intermittent offensive attempts of the Betis, with distant shots from Pedraza, stopped by Rui Silva, and Sergio Canales in 76, it came out near the left post.
Without any brilliance in the game, and already with the carousel of changes in both teams, Betis had the merit of maintaining the faith, which paid off 5 minutes from the end by tying Canales, after converting a penalty by grabbing Borja Iglesias’ shirt by Vallejo.
Betis took pride in achieving, three minutes later, the comeback by scoring Cristian Tello 2-1 with a shot from outside the area that overcame a forest of legs to sneak into Rui Silva’s goal, but Granada did not surrender and took advantage of local defensive weakness to equalize with the 2-2 of Soldado, when joining, completely alone, a ball after a corner. In the end, Rubi’s future is still in the air.
