Real Madrid 1-0 Athletic Club: Fede Valverde’s stoppage time goal keeps them within reach of Barcelona

Real Madrid breathed a sigh of relief in the dying moments of Sunday’s game against Athletic clubwhen Federico Valverde Scored in a stopping time to keep the ruling champions at the moving distance of first place in the La Liga title race.

The breakthrough came in the 93rd minute of a match in which Los Blancos was the better side, but sometimes looked far from their best. Real Madrid took the pace in the dying minutes of the game when they fervently searched for the Go-Ahead goal, which came out of Valverde in a spectacular way. He received the ball in the corner of the penalty area and hit him on the volley from that distance, and hit it hard enough to send him in the back of the net to give his side the victory.

View the strike below.

The ruling champions had Kylian Mbappe not available for them by suspension on Sunday, but the rest of their all-star crew started, including Vinicius Junior and Jude Bellingham. However, they rose a slow first half in which they only took one shot on goal and only gathered 0.25 expected goals from the five total shots.

There was a significant increase in taking shot after the break, when Handle came for Dani Ceballos While Los Blancos was looking for the Go-Ahead goal. They seemed to get the reward for their efforts in the 80th minute then Vinicius came with one Nice Finishing up close, but the goal was taken back after Endrick turned out to be in an offside position during the game. Nine minutes later, Bellingham hoped to win a penalty, and although the referee and crew considered it for a while, they ultimately ruled that the error in question did not justify Spot-Kick.

The goal of Valverde eventually ensured that Real Madrid would end the week on a positive note, especially after a disappointing week. Their crooked defeat against Arsenal in the UEFA Champions League meant that their trophy hunting this season from three potential titles to two, and exposed an imbalance in the team that was still present on Sunday. Their imperfections were also a characteristic of their double -winning season a year ago, although their creepy ability to win a victory, even in unideal conditions, have sometimes disappeared this season. It returned on Sunday and was able to offer a crucial boost to Real Madrid in the last weeks of the season, but they will have to maintain that momentum to keep pace in the title race at least.

Real Madrid has a formidable opponent BarcelonaWho only lost one match in 2025 and are in the middle of a piece of 29 days in which they will play nine games. Despite the congestion of the fixture that weigh heavily on the Hansi Flick side, they still succeeded in a wild comeback and an important 4-3 victory over Celta Vigo on Saturday to stay on top of the title race of La Liga and keep their Treble-Hoop alive. They end the weekend with a four -point advantage compared to Real Madrid with six games to play in competition.

What is the following

An important series of midweek fixtures awaits in La Liga, where both Real Madrid and Barcelona have the opportunity to use their claim in the title race. Barcelona plays seventh place Mallorca on Tuesday, while Real Madrid will take it in 12th place Geafe The next day. The couple will then be confronted with each other on Saturday for the latest edition of El Clasico in the Copa del Rey Final, which marks the first chance of both teams to collect large silverware this season.