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Rodrygo Scores Twice in Vinícius’ Absence as Spanish Leader Real Madrid Beats Athletic 2-0

Real Madrid's Brazilian forward #11 Rodrygo (2nd-R) celebrates with teammates after scoring his team's second goal during the Spanish league football match between Real Madrid CF and Athletic Club Bilbao at the Santiago Bernabeu stadium in Madrid on March 31, 2024. (AFP)
Real Madrid's Brazilian forward #11 Rodrygo (2nd-R) celebrates with teammates after scoring his team's second goal during the Spanish league football match between Real Madrid CF and Athletic Club Bilbao at the Santiago Bernabeu stadium in Madrid on March 31, 2024. (AFP)
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Rodrygo Scores Twice in Vinícius’ Absence as Spanish Leader Real Madrid Beats Athletic 2-0

Real Madrid's Brazilian forward #11 Rodrygo (2nd-R) celebrates with teammates after scoring his team's second goal during the Spanish league football match between Real Madrid CF and Athletic Club Bilbao at the Santiago Bernabeu stadium in Madrid on March 31, 2024. (AFP)
Real Madrid's Brazilian forward #11 Rodrygo (2nd-R) celebrates with teammates after scoring his team's second goal during the Spanish league football match between Real Madrid CF and Athletic Club Bilbao at the Santiago Bernabeu stadium in Madrid on March 31, 2024. (AFP)

Rodrygo thrived in the absence of Vinícius Júnior as Real Madrid beat Athletic Bilbao 2-0 on Sunday to keep an eight-point lead over Barcelona in the Spanish league.

Rodrygo scored both goals and Madrid maintained its comfortable lead at the top after Barcelona had won 1-0 at Las Palmas on Saturday.

Vinícius didn’t play because of a suspension over yellow cards, but Jude Bellingham was back in the squad after missing two straight league games because of a red-card suspension. The influential England international set up Rodrygo’s second goal in Madrid’s third straight league win.

Rodrygo’s opener came with a beautiful shot into the top corner from just outside the area eight minutes into the match at the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium.

The Brazil forward had scored for Brazil in a friendly against Spain at the Bernabeu last week, but he hadn’t found the net for Madrid in seven consecutive games.

“He played very well, made the difference with some high-quality plays,” Madrid coach Carlo Ancelotti said about Rodrygo.

The Brazilian said after the match he is not feeling threatened by the possible arrival of Kylian Mbappé.

“I think he is close (to being signed), from what everybody has been saying,” Rodrygo said. “I’m just focused on finishing the season well. It would be a nice problem for the coach to have next season. I’m not worried.”

Fourth-place Athletic arrived with its focus on next weekend’s Copa del Rey final against Mallorca. The Basque Country club will try to win the cup for the first time in four decades. Defender Yeray Álvarez left Sunday’s game with an apparent muscle injury in the 25th and could be doubtful for the final in Seville.

Athletic, which had won two in a row in the league, will drop to fifth place if Atletico Madrid wins at midtable Villarreal on Monday.

Also back in Madrid’s squad was central defender Éder Militão, who had been out for eight months because of a knee injury. He came off the bench in stoppage time to loud cheers from the Bernabeu crowd.

Brahim Díaz, who was in for Vinícius, nearly added to Madrid’s lead in the 49th with a shot that hit the post.

Tuesday’s “One Skin” friendly between Brazil and Spain at the Bernabeu, which ended 3-3, was set up after Vinícius was targeted by racial insults in a league match nearly a year ago.

Sunday’s league games came a day after the match between Getafe and Sevilla was marred by more racist insults against Sevilla player Marcos Acuña and Sevilla coach Quique Sánchez Flores.

Madrid wore its purple fourth uniform instead of its traditional white jersey.

Stuani leads Girona

Cristhian Stuani scored in stoppage time as Girona beat Real Betis 3-2 to move closer to securing a top-four finish.

The home win strengthened Girona’s hold on third place. It’s nine points ahead of fourth-place Athletic and 10 points in front of fifth-place Atletico Madrid, the first team outside the Champions League qualification places.

Girona visits Atletico next weekend in a key matchup with eight rounds remaining.

The Catalan club, which is part of the Abu Dhabi-backed City Football Group, is trying to make it to the Champions League for the first time.

Girona twice relinquished leads against seventh-place Betis, but earned the victory thanks to Stuani’s goal from inside the area two minutes into second-half stoppage time in pouring rain at Montilivi Stadium.

Artem Dovbyk scored the other two goals for the hosts, while Willian José got on the board twice for Betis, which saw its losing streak reach four straight league matches. Manuel Pellegrini’s team has one win in its last eight games in all competitions.

Relegation fight

Celta Vigo and Rayo Vallecano drew 0-0 in Vigo in a match between relegation-threatened clubs.

The result left Celta in 17th place, immediately behind Rayo.

Celta sits three points clear of the relegation zone, while Rayo is five points from danger. Rayo has one win in 12 matches.

Celta complained about two calls that went against the team — the first on a goal called off because of a foul, and then for a possible penalty kick late in the game.

Elsewhere, sixth-place Real Sociedad picked up its third straight victory by winning 1-0 at 13th-place Alaves.

Jon Pacheco scored the winner with a diving header in the 59th.

Alaves has one win in its last eight league matches.

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Coco Gauff Comes Back at US Open and Beats Elina Svitolina

USA's Coco Gauff celebrates winning the second set against Ukraine's Elina Svitolina during their women's singles third round match on day five of the US Open tennis tournament at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York City, on August 30, 2024. (Photo by TIMOTHY A. CLARY / AFP)
USA's Coco Gauff celebrates winning the second set against Ukraine's Elina Svitolina during their women's singles third round match on day five of the US Open tennis tournament at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York City, on August 30, 2024. (Photo by TIMOTHY A. CLARY / AFP)
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Coco Gauff Comes Back at US Open and Beats Elina Svitolina

USA's Coco Gauff celebrates winning the second set against Ukraine's Elina Svitolina during their women's singles third round match on day five of the US Open tennis tournament at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York City, on August 30, 2024. (Photo by TIMOTHY A. CLARY / AFP)
USA's Coco Gauff celebrates winning the second set against Ukraine's Elina Svitolina during their women's singles third round match on day five of the US Open tennis tournament at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York City, on August 30, 2024. (Photo by TIMOTHY A. CLARY / AFP)

Coco Gauff was not aware that she'd lost five consecutive matches against opponents ranked in the top 50. She was not sure exactly how many points in a row she'd dropped — 11, it turns out — to give away the first set against Elina Svitolina in the US Open’s third round on Friday.
Here, then, is what was entirely clear to Gauff at that moment: “I needed a reset.” So before the second set, the 20-year-old from Florida went to the bathroom, changed part of her outfit and splashed water on her face. Then Gauff went back on court and extended the defense of her first Grand Slam title by turning things around to beat the 27th-seeded Svitolina 3-6, 6-3, 6-3, The Associated Press reported.
“Felt like a new person coming out,” the third-seeded Gauff said. “I just didn’t want to leave the court with any regrets.”
After making mistake after mistake early on at Arthur Ashe Stadium, Gauff managed to reel off nine of 11 games in one stretch and won again despite losing the opening set, something she did three times en route to claiming the 2023 trophy at Flushing Meadows, including in the final against Aryna Sabalenka.
“It was in my mind today. It gave me a lot of confidence,” Gauff said, “just because it felt like déjà vu a little bit.”
On Sunday, Gauff will face No. 13 Emma Navarro, one of her teammates at the Paris Olympics, for a berth in the quarterfinals. Navarro eliminated Gauff in the fourth round at Wimbledon.
“I did a good job of neutralizing her serve and just playing really aggressive from the baseline and pushing back against her groundstrokes,” Navarro, who is from South Carolina and won an NCAA title for Virginia, said about that matchup last month. “And then always getting one more ball back in the court.”
Navarro advanced Friday with a 6-4, 4-6, 6-3 victory over No. 19 Marta Kostyuk. Other women's fourth-round matchups set up in the afternoon were No. 7 Zheng Qinwen vs. No. 24 Donna Vekic, and No. 26 Paula Badosa vs. Wang Yafan. No. 2 Sabalenka was set to play No. 29 Ekaterina Alexandrova at night, with the winner to face No. 33 Elise Mertens, who outlasted No. 14 Madison Keys in three sets.
The first men’s fourth-round pairing that was set up was No. 6 Andrey Rublev against No. 9 Grigor Dimitrov. No. 8 Casper Ruud will meet No. 12-seeded Taylor Fritz.
Zheng-Vekic is a rematch of the gold medal match at the Summer Games four weeks ago; Zheng won that one.
Vekic beat Gauff in the third round at the Olympics, part of Gauff's recent drought against top-50 foes. That also was part of a recent slump that saw Gauff win just five of her previous nine matches.
Such a contrast to a year ago, when Gauff won 18 of 19, and 12 in a row, along the way to two tuneup titles on hard courts and then the championship at the U.S. Open that made her the first U.S. teenager to triumph at Flushing Meadows since Serena Williams in 1999.
By the conclusion of one set against Svitolina, it seemed as if another loss might be in the offing. Gauff’s totals were 16 unforced errors — nine on backhands — and just seven winners. She put only 45% of her first serves in. She went 0 for 3 on break points. She allowed Svitolina to claim 19 of the 28 points that lasted more than four strokes.
All of those numbers got better across the last two sets as Gauff tried to be more aggressive with her forehands and be more careful with her backhands. And something else changed, at the behest of her coaches: Gauff got the partisan crowd more involved.
Svitolina said afterward she was bothered by an ankle injury picked up last week
“I feel like she started to go (for) more a little bit. But to be fair, I didn’t play the way that I wanted to play. ... Then she started to be more alive," said Svitolina, a three-time Slam semifinalist. "And, of course, the crowd was behind her."
Everything began to change for Gauff on Friday after 1 hour, 10 minutes, when she broke to lead 4-2 in the second set, smacking a cross-court forehand winner. She celebrated with a yell of “Come on!” and raised her left hand to wiggle her fingers and ask the spectators to get louder.
Soon that set belonged to Gauff, who closed it with a 94 mph ace, shook a fist and shouted.
In the third, with UConn women’s basketball stars Paige Bueckers and Azzi Fudd sitting in her guest box at Ashe, Gauff broke right away, then held to go up 2-0 with the help of one 38-stroke point that she took when Svitolina sent a backhand wide.
Soon it was 5-1 for Gauff, whose only late wobble came when she served for the match at 5-2. She wasted three match points and got broken there. But Gauff broke right back to close things out.
“I’m glad that I had that match,” Gauff said, “because I think it just makes me match-tough and gets me ready, probably, for future challenges.”