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Ademola Lookman’s first-half goal sent Atletico Madrid into the Champions League semi-finals with a 3-2 aggregate victory over 10-man Barcelona on Tuesday.
Early strikes from Lamine Yamal and Ferran Torres for the Catalans had levelled the tie on aggregate before Nigeria international Lookman replied for Diego Simeone’s team.
Eric Garcia’s red card 11 minutes from time gave Barca an uphill challenge, having also finished the first leg with 10 men, and their 2-1 victory on the night was not enough to avoid elimination.
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Arsenal were eliminated from a second competition in the space of three weeks, after losing 2-1 at Southampton.
The last quarter-final game will see West Ham take on Leeds United on Sunday.
Chelsea are now mathematically out of the Premier League title race following their 3-0 drubbing in the hands of Everton at the Hill Dickinson Stadium on Saturday night.
Liam Rosenior’s men came into the match with 48 points, looking to keep pace with the teams in front of them.
However, Beto opened the scoring for the hosts in the first half, before adding a second after the break.
Chelsea barely threatened Everton and looked flat for most of the game, before Iliman Ndiaye added a third.
The result means the Blues cannot match the 70 points that league leaders Arsenal currently have with seven matches left.
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Champions Liverpool are also on the verge of being mathematically ruled out, as they have 49 points.
Manchester United opened a three-point advantage over Aston Villa in the race for Champions League qualification with a composed 3-1 victory at Old Trafford on Sunday, their seventh win in nine matches under interim manager Michael Carrick, and a fifth consecutive home success that has transformed the picture at the top of the table since the former midfielder took charge in January.
Three weeks ago United and Villa were level on points. Now, with eight Premier League fixtures remaining, United sit third and Villa fourth, the gap between them exactly three points and the gap to fifth-placed Chelsea six. United are seven points behind second-placed Manchester City but have effectively locked down their position above all teams outside the top four. The afternoon also provided a platform for Bruno Fernandes, whose two assists took his Premier League tally for the season to sixteen — one beyond David Beckham’s previous United record of fifteen in the 1999-2000 campaign — and whose creative output has underpinned every convincing Carrick performance in the past two months.
The first half produced almost nothing of consequence. United controlled possession and territory, but without the cutting edge to test Emiliano Martinez consistently. Matheus Cunha crossed dangerously from the left early on, and Amad Diallo’s header from inside the box drew a sharp save from the Villa goalkeeper, but Villa’s defence — organised carefully by Unai Emery — offered United no channel to exploit. The teams went in goalless.
The second half was different in character from the moment it began. Casemiro opened the scoring in the 53rd minute with a run that belied any suggestion he had lost a step. Fernandes curled a corner toward the near post, Casemiro timed his movement perfectly and glanced a header past Martinez with precision that made the finish look simpler than it was.
The goal came after a spell of second-half pressure that had United pushing Villa back into their own half from the restart, and it was the reward the crowd had sensed was coming. Old Trafford responded with chants of “one more year” for a midfielder whose contract expires at the end of the season and whose future at the club remains publicly unresolved.
Villa responded with a goal of real quality. In the 64th minute, Lucas Digne played the ball across the face of the penalty area after United failed to clear a corner properly, and Ross Barkley, making his first Premier League start in fourteen months, met it with a controlled first-time finish that gave Senne Lammens no chance. There was a nervous wait to determine whether Amadou Onana had been in an offside position, but the goal was given, and Villa were level.
