Copa Del Rey final: Gareth Bale proves his worth

Bale: Proving his worth, yet again

In an astonishing table turning match, Barcelona went down to a Real Madrid squad held up by wonder summer signing Gareth Bale. Bale sneaked in a late winner through the legs of stand-in Barcelona keeper Jose Manuel Pinto. Barcelona’s continuously gained possession fell to nothing as Madrid were able to punish Barcelona on the counter.

Gareth Bale showed great speed and read the game well as he kept running rings around the Barcelona defense and challenging Pinto with strike after strike on goal. Manuel Pinto has taken over goal after Victor Valdes’s knee injury put him out for the season.

Argentine international Angel Di Maria scored the only goal of the first half to give Real Madrid the lead. The Barcelona attack looked to be crumbling as wave after wave of offence threatened to increase the advantage Real Madrid were holding.

The equalizer was a commendable header by Marc Bartra, central defender for Barcelona. Iker Casillas was helpless as the ball flew into the back of the net after clipping the post and Barcelona were back in the game.

The pace of the match really began to move with an ebb and flow as Barcelona kept pushing forward in search of a winner while Real kept breaking on the counter. Manuel Pinto looked increasingly uncomfortable as his defensive line moved higher up the field in search of a winner.

Barcelona kept pressing ahead keeping more of the possession, playing through balls and short passes, making runs down the wing, but to no avail.

Lionel Messi seemed to be absent on the field. He wasn’t able to create chances for himself, nor push Neymar or Cesc Fabregas through the defense. Perhaps the absence of his arch-rival Cristiano Ronaldo put him off his game.

Real were focussing on their defense; no player tried to dribble his way out of trouble, continuous clearances were made from in and around the six-yard box. Breaking on the counter seemed to be half-time instructions from manager Carlo Ancoletti.

Gareth Bale’s moment came after an outlet headed clearance by Pepe to the wings. Isco passed the ball to Luka Modric, who judged a precise pass to Gareth Bale moving ahead of him down the wing.

Bale saw that there was no way he could take on Marc Bartra while also dribbling the ball towards goal. So he sought a clever trick by flicking the ball onward and using his pace to get to the ball.

A fast sprint down the wing, some of it even out of the field, and Bale moved right up ahead to face Jose Manuel Pinto and slotted the ball through the legs of the keeper into the back of the net.

In the dying minutes of the game, Neymar got an easy opportunity to chip to ball over goalkeeper Iker Casillas but as before, the finishing was not up to the mark. The ball hit the post and rebounded straight into the waiting keeper’s arms and that was that.

Real kept possession for the next couple of minutes stretching into extra time, and as the referee’s whistle blew, the look of disappointment was evident on the face of each Barcelona fan in the Mestalla stadium as Madrid clinched victory.

Although Cristiano Ronaldo was sitting among the crowd watching as his team battled to and fro for the Copa Del Rey title, his prowess on the field was not missed.

Gareth Bale was up to the task, supported by the other wing-striker Angel Di Maria, both of them who scored a goal to bring the Copa Del Rey Cup to the Santiago Bernebeu for the nineteenth (19th) time in the history of the club, as Real Madrid enhanced their streak of Copa Del Rey Titles to 3 years in a row.