Europe

Conditions conspired to give us a glimpse of a rarely used, outdated tactic on Saturday: an authentic and faithful use of man-marking during Girona’s hosting of Barcelona at the Estadi Montilivi. What this means is that Girona defender Pablo Maffeo was entirely sacrificed to negate the influence of Barcelona’s Lionel Messi — wherever Messi went, there was Maffeo. When Girona were in possession, Maffeo continued to mark Messi. In fact, Maffeo was substituted in the 78th minute after recording only 10 touches. 

Valencia maintained their unbeaten start to La Liga play with an impressive 3-2 victory over Real Sociedad at the Anoeta on Sunday. With the score level at 2-2 and both sides down to 10-men, Italian striker Simone Zaza hit the game-winner in the 85th minute with the assist provided by 20-year-old Portuguese attacker Goncalo Guedes.

Real Sociedad have quietly gone about assembling one of the strongest squads in all of La Liga, but their promising start to the season was brought to a halt by Levante center half Chema Rodriguez last night. Levante would ultimately win 3-0, but it was Chema’s wonder goal on the stroke of halftime that put his side ahead for good.

Apparently, even eSports talents can get sent out on loan. Ajax, for decades a premier producer of precocious players, is also one of the frontrunners in the eSports world. On Thursday they signed new player Lev Vinken to their squad — and immediately sent him out on loan to league rival Sparta Rotterdam.