\n<\/p>\n
Kylian Mbapp\u00e9\u2019s second-half penalty secured for Real Madrid a hard-fought 1-0 home victory against Osasuna in their opening La Liga game of the season on Tuesday, giving Xabi Alonso a winning start in his first league match in charge of the hosts.<\/p>\n
After struggling to break down a stubborn Osasuna defence in the opening half, Mbapp\u00e9 won the penalty and converted from the spot six minutes after the break to give Real the lead, but the home side were unable to increase their advantage.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the first half we didn\u2019t have space and then in the second half we scored early,\u201d Mbapp\u00e9 told Real Madrid TV. \u201cWe had more chances and we had more control, we expected to score the second but it didn\u2019t come.\u201d<\/p>\n
The visitors had Abel Bretones sent off in added time for a foul off the ball on Gonzalo Garc\u00eda as Alonso\u2019s side got their league campaign off to a winning but underwhelming start as they look to wrestle back the league title from Barcelona.<\/p>\n
Alonso\u2019s side, whose last competitive game ended in a 4-0 defeat against Paris Saint-Germain in the Club World Cup semi-finals, completely dominated against a visiting side clearly content to sit back and perhaps come away with a draw, which they almost managed.<\/p>\n
Real enjoyed plenty of possession in the opening 45 minutes with lots of slick passing, but their only real chances came through shots from distance, with \u00c9der Milit\u00e3o\u2019s powerful strike forcing the Osasuna goalkeeper Sergio Herrera into a decent save.<\/p>\n
All Osasuna\u2019s defensive work was undone shortly after the break when a foul by Juan Cruz on Mbapp\u00e9 was punished with a penalty, and Real\u2019s French forward stepped up and sent the keeper the wrong way as the hosts finally found the net.<\/p>\n
<\/span>Kylian Mbapp\u00e9 scores his second-half penalty to settle the match.<\/span> Photograph: Antonio Villalba\/Real Madrid\/Getty Images<\/p>\n The goal forced Osasuna out of their shell somewhat, while Real pushed to find a second goal to kill off the game, with Arda Guler unleashing a shot from outside the area which zipped just over the bar.<\/p>\n Alonso, who started the game with three of the club\u2019s new signings \u2013 Trent Alexander-Arnold, Dean Huijsen and \u00c1lvaro Carreras \u2013 in his back four, then sent on the 18-year-old Argentinian midfielder Franco Mastantuono for his Real debut.<\/p>\n Mastantuono almost made an immediate impact, with his effort from a wide angle saved by Herrera at his near post. Minutes earlier, Osasuna had their chance to snatch what would have been an undeserved equaliser but Ante Budimir headed over from inside the six-yard box.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was important for us to start with a win at home, we knew it was going to be difficult,\u201d Mbapp\u00e9 said. \u201cOsasuna had a clear plan to wait for us and they had Budimir. We are happy with the victory and we are going for more.\u201d<\/p>\n With Barcelona beating Mallorca 3-0 in their opening game on Saturday, three points were already a must for Alonso, and he did it without the injured Jude Bellingham, Ferland Mendy, Eduardo Camavinga and Endrick, as well as the suspended Antonio R\u00fcdiger.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Kylian Mbapp\u00e9\u2019s second-half penalty secured for Real Madrid a hard-fought 1-0 home victory against Osasuna in their opening La Liga game of the season on Tuesday, giving Xabi Alonso a winning start in his first league match in charge of the hosts. After struggling to break down a stubborn Osasuna defence in the opening half,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16719,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[3293,5412,10005,9607,1408,577,10006,455,1587,4657],"class_list":{"0":"post-16718","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-alonso","9":"tag-fires","10":"tag-kylian","11":"tag-liga","12":"tag-madrid","13":"tag-mbappe","14":"tag-osasuna","15":"tag-real","16":"tag-start","17":"tag-winning"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16718"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16718\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/16719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}