MADRID, 1 February 2005 — A spectacular trademark free kick from David Beckham and a late strike from defender Michel Salgado enabled Real Madrid to scramble a nervous 2-1 win over basement side Numancia in the Primera Liga on Sunday.
The victory, which left Real seven points behind leaders Barcelona, was secured as the England captain curled a 25-meter shot over the wall into the far corner in the second half and Salgado slotted home seven minutes from time to put Real 2-0 up.
But they also had goalkeeper Iker Casillas to thank after a fine stop to smother a first half penalty and another great save to prevent Numancia from grabbing a late equalizer.
The victory was vital for Real after Barcelona had produced a devastating second-half display to power their way to a 4-0 win over Sevilla on Saturday and inflict a first home defeat of the season on the Andalucians. Espanyol took advantage of Sevilla’s defeat to reclaim fourth spot despite being held to a 2-2 draw at home to Real Betis.
The performance of the day came from Villarreal, who notched up their fourth win in a row with the 4-0 trouncing of out-of-sorts Real Sociedad.
Uruguayan striker Diego Forlan scored two second-half goals to take his tally for the season to 13.
The former Manchester United player broke the deadlock in the 58th minute when he cracked the ball in from 10 meters.
He then provided the pass for Juan Roman Riquelme to make it 2-0 before helping himself to a second eight minutes from time.
Former AC Milan and Atletico Madrid forward Jose Mari completed the rout with a virtuoso effort in stoppage time, inflicting a fifth successive defeat on the Basque side.
The result pushed Villareal up to sixth in the table, a point behind Sevilla and Espanyol.
Meantime, Nicolas Anelka’s 7.0 million pound ($13.17 million) move from Manchester City to Fenerbahce looked set to be the most expensive on the last day of trading before the January transfer window closed yesterday.
On a slow day of activity, Argentine international defender Fabricio Coloccini went from AC Milan to Deportivo Coruna in Spain for an undisclosed sum, while Cameroon midfielder Eric Djemba-Djemba left Manchester United for Aston Villa after 18 months at Old Trafford.
Villa have agreed an initial payment of 1.35 million pounds for the player, and might have to pay an additional 500,000 pounds for him depending on appearances.
While there was a degree of activity around Europe many of the deals involved loan transfers and apart from Anelka’s move to Turkey, none involved any big money sums for high profile players. However, some late deals could yet materialize.
and in keeping with the secretive nature of the market, there were rumours of one or two other big transfers still pending.
Among those definitely heading for new destinations were former French midfielder Christian Karembeu, Spanish midfielder Mikel Arteta and Slovenian striker Aleksandar Rodic.
Karembeu, a member of France’s 1998 World Cup-winning squad left debt-ridden Servette on loan to Bastia in France until the end of the season, while Spanish midfielder Arteta joined Everton on loan, also until May, from Real Sociedad.
Rodic, who completed a memorable day by being called up to the Slovenian senior squad for the first time, joined Portsmouth from Nova Gorica.
Other deals involved former French international defender Vincent Candela joining Bolton Wanderers on loan from AS Roma until the end of the season, Dutch goalkeeper Ronald Waterreus moving from Manchester City to Rangers on a one-year deal and Bundesliga side Hanover 96 signing former Atletico Madrid striker Veljko Paunovic subject to a medical. Although a number of other deals were still being discussed or finalised as the midnight CET deadline approached, the few modestly priced deals that were going ahead underlined the depression in the transfer market from the high of a few years ago.
