Easy away wins for Barca and Valencia in Copa del Rey

Easy away wins for Barca and Valencia in Copa del Rey

 MADRID, Oct. 30 (Xinhua) -- FC Barcelona strolled to a comfortable win away to Deportivo Alaves in the first leg of the third round of the Spanish Copa del Rey on Tuesday night.

Goals from David Villa¹ and Andres Iniesta took the reigning² Copa del Rey champions to victory against the third tier Basque side that is best known for its appearance in the final of the 2001 UEFA Cup.

Barcelona coach Tito Vilanova fielded a strong side with Sergio Busquets, Dani Alves and Javier Mascherano all in the Barca side along with the goalscorers.

The home side were cheered on by a full ground and made life hard for Barca until Villa opened the scoring with a good finish from an Iniesta pass.

Iniesta made the game safe five minutes into the second half and Cesc Fabrigas added a third in the last minute to make sure that the return leg in Barcelona will be contractual obligation with hardly any chance of a brave Alaves side causing an upset.

Valencia also virtually assured their progress into the last 16 with a 2-0 win away to third tier side Llagostera.

On a rain soaked artificial pitch, Valencia relied on remaining tight in defense³ and relied on their effectiveness from set pieces: Jonas Goncalves opened the scoring with a header from a free kick just before the break, while Nelson Valdez headed home from a corner with 22 minutes remaining.

LLagostera had a chance to get back into the game eight minutes from time, but Marc Sellares sent his spot kick against the post to make the return leg in two weeks' time virtually irrelevant⁴.

The remained of the Copa del Rey first leg ties will be played on Wednesday and Thursday.

1 villa   

n.别墅，城郊小屋

参考例句：

• We rented a villa in France for the summer holidays.我们在法国租了一幢别墅消夏。
• We are quartered in a beautiful villa.我们住在一栋漂亮的别墅里。

2 reigning   

adj.统治的，起支配作用的

参考例句：

• The sky was dark, stars were twinkling high above, night was reigning, and everything was sunk in silken silence. 天很黑，星很繁，夜阑人静。
• Led by Huang Chao, they brought down the reigning house after 300 years' rule. 在黄巢的带领下，他们推翻了统治了三百年的王朝。

3 defense   

n.防御，保卫；[pl.]防务工事；辩护，答辩

参考例句：

• The accused has the right to defense.被告人有权获得辩护。
• The war has impacted the area with military and defense workers.战争使那个地区挤满了军队和防御工程人员。

4 irrelevant   

adj.不恰当的，无关系的，不相干的

参考例句：

• That is completely irrelevant to the subject under discussion.这跟讨论的主题完全不相关。
• A question about arithmetic is irrelevant in a music lesson.在音乐课上，一个数学的问题是风马牛不相及的。