REAL MADRID VS LEGANES: 4-2
Alvaro Morata scores a hat-trick in a thriller of La Liga. Real Madrid once again leapfrogs Barcelona to regain their top spot in La Liga points table. Madrid raced into a three-goal lead thanks to consecutive goals from Morata and James but was soon counter-attacked by Leganes when striker Gabriel Pires and Luciano Naves scored impressive goals. Alvaro Morata became the first Spanish player to score a League hat-trick for Madrid since Raul achieved the feet in 2009.
Coming to the match Zinedine Zidane took a tough decision to place a new team 
against the Leganes as he made nine changes ahead of some crucial matches against Atletico Madrid, Bayern Munich and Barca. Star striker Ronaldo, Bale too missed out whereas Benzema was named as a substitute. Team formation of Real Madrid was pretty much straight and clear as their mindset 4-3-3 as their main focus was to test their player’s bench strength, and they did stand on the full expectation of their Coach decision. On the other hand, Leganes followed 3-2-4-1 formation. It was good to see that young Real Madrid did everything at their best with 60% ball possession with 17 shots out of which 8 were on target. It was 15’of the match when Marco Asensio superbly set him up intercepting Unai Bustinza’s pass just inside Leganes and just putting a dolly in front James who did no mistakes to score the opening goal for Madrid. The corner was awarded to Madrid in 18’minutes James took it and Nacho’s flick found Morata at the far post and Morata scored with an impressive looping header over the goalkeeper. Morata soon scored his second goal of the match when Mateo Kovacic surged forward and slipped a through ball to Morata who convincingly beat Herrerin to score. Leganes then fought back to score as Diego Rico avoided an offside to clear down a left cutback to deflect Sergio Ramos to Pires, who stretch in to convert his fourth goal of the season. Just then Alexander Szymanowski’s corner headed close to Ramos towards his own goal but Naves applied some finishing touch to score from six yards inside the box. At the end of first half, the score was 3-2 in favour of Real Madrid. That was a thriller of first half as both the team’s scoring goal in quick succession.
BARCELONA TOPS THE LA LIGA WITH A VICTORY AGAINST SEVILLARight from the start of the second half Real Madrid looked positive and scored in 48’ when James clipped a free-kick from the left flank where Morata scores from a brilliant header. Leganes then tried hard to come back into the game but Madrid looked more comfortable after the break to see Leganes out. Morata the player of the match created few chances just before the close of the match but failed to convert them. At the end of full-time, Real Madrid leads the scores 4-2, and are again on top of La Liga league table.
MATCH STATS:
- Real Madrid has won all their matches at Butarque, comprising of two in Copa del Rey and one in La Liga.
- Alvaro Morata has scored 11 goals in La Liga this season his best scores in the single match.
- Real Madrid has scored in 51 consecutive matches in all matches played so far, their best run ever in La Liga.
