Girona deal Zaragoza a heavy blow

Girona FC came out 0-3 winners from the first leg of their first round promotion playoff tie against Real Zaragoza, a game in which the Catalans all but sealed their opponents' fate in the opening half thanks to goals from Jaime Mata and Florian Lejeune. Mata popped up with another goal after the break to extend Girona's lead to 0-3.

Both sides got off to the type of blistering pace that the occasion called for. The first real chance on goal fell to Zaragoza in the ninth minute, when William José found Rubén González with a pin-point cross, however, the defender's headed effort was kept out by a magnificent Isaac Becerra save. The deadlock was broken in the 23rd minute. Jaime Mata latched onto a calamitous error by Óscar Alexander Whalley who, while trying to launch the ball forward, failed to notice the Girona forward sneaking in behind him to rob the ball and then pass it into the empty net. The home team had a chance to level matters shortly afterwards through an Albert Dorca attempt in the air, but once again Becerra was at hand to save Girona's blushes. Florian Lejeune widened the gap to 0-2 just before the half-time whistle by getting on the end of a corner kick. 

Ranko Popović's men pushed further up the field after the restart in search of a quick goal to get themselves back into the match. Pedro was the first of the La Romareda outfit's players to try his luck, but his long-distance strike went agonisingly wide. Nonetheless, yet again it was the Catalans who celebrated the next goal when Jaime Mata struck a sweet volley to make it 0-3. Zaragoza kept looking for a way back into the tie during the dying minutes but were unable to ruffle the inspired Becerra. As such, Girona will take a comfortable 0-3 lead into the second leg.