Valencia and Sevilla play out hard-fought draw

In a game that was full of intensity and fighting spirit, Valencia were able to come back from a goal down to draw 1-1 at home to Sevilla on Wednesday night.

Lucas Ocampos opened the scoring in first-half stoppage time, but substitute Ruben Sobrino levelled things up in the 81st minute, Marca.com reported.

The first 45 minutes did not see too many chances, with Kangin Lee having the best chance of the opening period for Valencia, although his volley from a good Ferran Torres cross went just over the bar.

There was some bad news for Julen Lopetegui and Sevilla in the 28th minute as Sergio Escudero had to be replaced by Nemanja Gudelj after being elbowed in the nose by Diego Carlos, which led to a lengthy stoppage.

Once again, Ocampos impressed and he was everywhere in the first half, getting involved in the play and constantly battling Valencia left-back Jose Gaya.

The 40th minute also saw Valencia lose a man as Francis Coquelin had to come off with what appeared to be a hamstring problem, so Geoffrey Kondogbia came on in his place.

There were six minutes of added time at the end of the first half and two minutes in, Ocampos opened the scoring. Sevilla won the ball back and following a few passes, Fernando received the ball on the right flank and pulled the ball back for the Argentine, who hit a first-time shot past Jasper Cillessen in the Valencia goal. Ocampos then put his hands to his ears after having suffered a lot of abuse from the Mestalla crowd in the first half.

The second half saw plenty of big tackles fly in, which led to many yellow cards being dished out.

Valencia were without a handful of players, such as Rodrigo Moreno and Kevin Gameiro, so the goalscoring responsibility was on Maxi Gomez's shoulders, yet the Uruguayan once again disappointed.

Instead, it came down to the two of Valencia's substitutes, Manu Vallejo and Ruben Sobrino, to offer a threat in front of goal.

In the 75th minute, Vallejo thought that he had equalised but was frustrated to see that the linesman's flag was up. Dani Parejo's pass in the direction of Jose Gaya ended up hitting Kondogbia and deflecting over the Sevilla defence, with Vallejo failing to control it at the first attempt but then firing under Tomas Vaclik with his second. However, he was about a yard off when Parejo's pass was played.

Five minutes later, Valencia were able to celebrate a legitimate goal. Parejo was involved, as he has been in most of Los Che's strikes this season, as his perfect free-kick found the open Sobrino in the box, who simply guided his header into the far corner of Vaclik's goal.