Football: Weekend Review!

Despite similar circumstances, there were contrasting fortunes for the Soweto giants as both came up against teams under the tutelage of stand-in coaches at the weekend.

Kaizer Chiefs faced a SuperSport United team without coach Staurt Baxter, who was off sick, and Orlando Pirates clashed with Chippa United, who placed coach Dan Malesela on special leave.
Sulley Muntari walked off the pitch during a match in protest against racial abuse from a group of children and got booked by the referee for his remonstration.

Sunderland were relegated from the Premier League while Burnley and Swansea made huge strides towards their survival. On the other end of the table, Chelsea continue to cruise towards the title, closely followed by Tottenham Hotspurs, who beat Arsenal to cancel out “ST Totteringham’s Day”.

Real Madrid and Barcelona are tied on points at the top of the Spanish La Liga table as the season draws to a close but Zinedine Zidane’s men still have a game in hand over the Catalans.


BLUES CLOSE IN ON TITLE, SPURS WIN DERBY
 
Chelsea took a significant step towards the Premier League title on Sunday with victory at Everton but Tottenham ensured the champagne will stay on ice for a bit longer with an impressive 2-0 win over Arsenal.
Arsenal's defeat in the last North London derby at White Hart Lane leaves manager Arsene Wenger's proud record of qualifying for the Champions League in real trouble. They are sixth, five points behind United and six behind City in fourth, although the Londoners have a game in hand on both.

Manchester City had to come from behind twice to draw 2-2 at Middlesbrough. United drew 1-1 at home to Swansea on a bad day for the Manchester giants against relegation candidates, making the fight for the title and the battle for the two remaining Champions League places a real dogfight.
Eldin Jakupovic saved an injury-time penalty as Hull City inched closer to Premier League safety and condemned Sunderland to relegation by drawing 0-0 at Southampton.

DOWNS TOP, BUCS STORM INTO TOP EIGHT
 
Goals from skipper Hlompho Kekana and Motjeka Madisha powered defending champions Mamelodi Sundowns to a fifth straight league victory as they overcame Golden Arrows 2-0 away to move top of the Absa Premiership table.

Title challengers Bidvest Wits won by the same score line at relegation-threatened Highlands Park, who reacted to the loss by sacking coach Gordon Igesund.

Elsewhere , SuperSport United and Kaizer Chiefs played to an entertaining 2-2 draw, which dented both team’s title hopes, though Amakhosi veteran Siphiwe Tshabalala deserves a special salute for netting two goals on his 300th start for the Soweto giants.

Orlando Pirates stormed into the top eight with a 2-1 home win over Chippa United, and Polokwane City won 2-1 at Free State Stars for the only away victory of the weekend (and their third in succession).
Ajax Cape Town took a potentially decisive step away from the relegation scrap with a very welcome 2-0 home win over Platinum Stars, while lower-table strugglers Baroka FC and Bloemfontein Celtic played to a 1-1 draw in Limpopo.

Sundowns and Wits will meet for a potential title decider in Johannesburg on Monday evening, with the match following directly after Cape Town City play away to Maritzburg United.

BARCA, REAL TIED TOP OF LA LIGA
 
Barcelona and Real Madrid remain locked together on 81 points at the top of La Liga after seeing off Espanyol and Valencia respectively on Saturday.

Madrid maintain the edge as they have a game in hand but needed a winner four minutes from time from Marcelo to see off Valencia 2-1.

Luis Suarez scored twice as Barcelona gratefully pounced on a series of Espanyol errors to win the Catalan derby 3-0 and move top of the table thanks to their better head-to-head record over Real.

Next up for Real is a Champions League semifinal first leg on Tuesday at home to an Atletico Madrid side full of confidence after they thumped Las Palmas 5-0 to move three points clear of Sevilla in third.

Atletico struck three times in the first 18 minutes in the Canary Islands as Kevin Gameiro netted a double either side of Saul Niguez's header. Kevin-Prince Boateng was then sent off for Las Palmas and Atletico made their man advantage count with further goals from Thomas Partey and Fernando Torres.

Tony Adams's Granada were relegated after they lost for the fourth straight game since the Englishman took charge, going down 2-1 at Real Sociedad.
Elsewhere, Leganes's survival hopes were dented by a 2-0 loss at Eibar and Deportivo la Coruna moved eight points clear of the relegation zone with just three games remaining, thanks to a 2-2 draw at already relegated Osasuna.
Meanwhile, Levante sealed promotion back to La Liga with a 1-0 win over Real Oviedo.

NAPOLI CLOSE IN ON ROMA
 
A first-half winner from Jose Callejon handed Napoli the points from a 1-0 win at Inter Milan on Sunday that closed the gap on Roma in second to a point.

Maurizio Sarri's men travelled to the San Siro buoyed by Roma's earlier 3-1 derby defeat to Lazio that left the capital contenders nine points adrift of leaders Juventus.

Roma remain second at nine points behind Juventus with four games to play, but Luciano Spalletti's men are now just one point ahead of Napoli, who remain seven points ahead of Lazio, in fourth.

Earlier, Milan spurned the chance to take the advantage, suffering a second league setback since their takeover by a Chinese consortium. Milan travelled to relegation-haunted Crotone looking to make up for a shock 2-1 San Siro defeat to struggling Empoli last week.

But for the second game in succession Vincenzo Montella's side disappointed in a 1-1 draw.
Elsewhere, former Roma striker Mattia Destro struck in either half to complete a brace as Bologna secured their top flight survival with a comprehensive 4-0 win over Udinese.

Genoa and Empoli, however, face a nervous end to the season after defeats to Chievo and Sassuolo respectively left them just above the drop zone.

MONACO MARCH ON, PSG CHOKE
 
Mario Balotelli hit his 14th league goal of the season and Ricardo Pereira scored a cracker as Nice blew a big hole in Paris Saint Germain's title defence with a 3-1 win on Sunday.

PSG are chasing a third consecutive sweep of domestic honours but finished the weekend three points behind Ligue 1 leaders Monaco, who also have a game in hand, and played the last moments in Nice with only nine men after they had two men sent off in quick succession.

Nice, still unbeaten at home this season, stay third but are now just three points behind PSG and both have only three games left to play.
Unai Emery's PSG, who came into the top-of-the-table encounter on an excellent unbeaten run since their Champions League collapse at Barcelona early last month, enjoyed plenty of the ball in the first half but did little with it.

Monaco, who face Juventus in a Champions League semifinal first leg on Wednesday, beat Toulouse 3-1 on Saturday with teenage striking sensation Kylian Mbappe again among the goals.
Prolific Monaco – they average nearly three goals a game in the league – are pursuing a first French league crown since 2000.

MUNTARI RACIALLY ABUSED
 
Ghana's Sulley Muntari dramatically walked off the pitch while playing for Pescara at Cagliari on Sunday after his complaints of racist abuse were met with a yellow card.

The former AC Milan and Inter midfielder, who claimed the abuse also came from children, angrily confronted Cagliari fans, shouting at them: "This is my colour."

Muntari, 32, could now face disciplinary measures after deciding to leave the field seconds before fulltime – a decision that earned him a second yellow card, and then a red, from referee Daniele Minelli.
Earlier, he had spoken directly with a section of the Cagliari supporters targeting him with racist abuse.
"They shouted at me from the beginning of the game, and in the first half I saw children in the group, so I went to their parents and gave them my jersey to set an example and to say you are not supposed to do that," he said.

"I tried to reason with them but the referee told me I had to stop. That's when I got pissed off. Why did he not stop the match?
"I am not a victim, but I am convinced that if they stopped the matches, this kind of thing would not happen any more."

While leaving the pitch in frustration and murmuring "Basta! (Enough)", Muntari went to address more supporters, showing them his arm and shouting: "This is my colour, this is my colour."

WHAT THEY SAID?
 
"He asked the referee to intervene, but he (said he had) neither heard nor seen anything. Sulley Muntari was right, but he shouldn't have left the pitch." - Pescara coach Zdenek Zeman
"Well done to them, but when you start the championship the target is not to finish above Spurs, it is to fight for the title. In 20 years it happened once. Mathematically it has to happen once. We're not happy with it but we don't compare ourselves to Spurs, we compare ourselves to where we want to be." – Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger