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Exciting start Plenty of goals on opening day of Champions League
LISBON, Portugal (AP) -- An own goal 15 minutes from the end by Sporting Lisbon defender Rui Jorge handed reigning European champion Real Madrid a hard-fought 2-2 tie Tuesday in the opening round of the European Champions Cup as the Spanish club battled back from a two-goal deficit. Luis Figo broke down the left flank after 75 minutes and pulled the ball back. Raul Gonzalez met the ball but his shot was going wide until it hit Jorge's outstretched leg and deflected into the net for the late equalizer. Ricardo Sa Pinto and Brazilian Andre Cruz had put the Lisbon club ahead with goals within three minutes late in the first half. Roberto Carlos pulled one back for the visitor after 50 minutes. Sporting Lisbon, a once-mighty club which last season clinched its first Portuguese title in 18 years, had the best of the first half. Sa Pinto opened the scoring after 38 minutes when he beat defenders to the front post to head in a curling corner from Cruz. Cruz got on the scoresheet soon after with a dipping freekick that left goalie Iker Casillas flailing. Real Madrid, pursuing a record ninth Champions Cup but missing two key players through injury -- striker Fernando Morientes and defender Fernando Hierro -- looked ragged. Portuguese midfield star Luis Figo, returning to his old ground, made little impression on the game. Five minutes after the restart, with the visitor looking sharper, Carlos drove a thundering freekick into the back of the net, leaving goalie Peter Schmeichel no chance.
Valencia 2, Olympiakos 1VALENCIA, Spain (AP) -- Two header goals by Ruben Baraja and Diego Alonso lifted Valencia to 2-1 victory over Olympiakos in Group C of the European Champions League here Tuesday. Ruben Baraja slotted Valencia, last year's finalist, into the lead with a goal from a header off a corner in the 35th minute. Ten minutes later, Uruguay's Diego Alonso nodded in the second from a free kick on the right wing by Gaizka Mendieta. Olympiakos' closest chance in the first half came with a volley from outside the area by Brazilian Luciano that went narrowly wide to the right. Valencia came out to dominate again in the second half but Yugoslav Pedrag Djordjevic pulled one back for the Greek side in the 74th minute. Valencia's Italian defender Andrei Carboni missed a third by inches (centimeters) when he broke through into the area and from some 10 yards (meters) pounded the ball off the right upright bar. Galatasaray 3, Monaco 2ISTANBUL, Turkey (AP) -- Istanbul's Galatasaray defeated Monaco 3-2 in the first-ever Champions League rotating game played here Tuesday. It was the first time UEFA Cup champion Galatasaray won an opening game in the Champions league. Brazilian striker Mario Jardel opened the scoring in the 16th minute, sending the ball into the Monaco net after receiving a pass from Hasan Unsal. In the 29th minute, Galatasaray's Romanian veteran Gheorghe Hagi scored a spectacular goal from out of the penalty area. The French first division champs Monaco equalized the score in the second half, with Shabani Nonda scoring in the 50th minute and Marco Simon in the 62nd minute, from a penalty kick following a tackle with Emre Belozoglu in the penalty area. Monaco's comeback heightened tensions, resulting in the ejection of Hagi in the 69th minute and Ousmane Dabo about two minutes later. Carlos Alberot De Oliviera 'Capone' of Brazil settled the score in the 80th minute with a header. Monaco played without Chilean Olympian Pablo Contreras and injured Portuguese international Francisco Da Costa. Galatasaray's Brazilian goalie, Claudio Andre Taffarel, who has been recently criticized by the media for letting easy goals into the Galatasaray net, stopped several possible goals. Taffarel apologized this week for his bad performance in a league game over the weekend in which Galatasaray was beaten 2-1 by Samsunspor, thus losing the lead in the Turkish first division league.
Spartak Moscow 2, Bayer Leverkusen 0MOSCOW (AP) - Artyom Bezrodny scored the winner and made an assist as Spartak Moscow posted a 2-0 victory over Bayer Leverkusen Tuesday in the Champions League Group A first round opener. Spartak dominated the first half of the match, but the only scoring opportunity came in the fading minutes, when a shot from Brazilian Luis Robson from 12 meters was blocked by Bayer goalkeeper Pascal Zuberbuhler. Six minutes into the second half, Yegor Titov opened scoring from 11 meters on a pass from Bezrodny, firing a kick into the right lower corner of the German goal past the diving goalkeeper. Ten minutes later, Christoph Daum, coach for Leverkusen, made two substitutes to enhance Bayer's offensive. In the 66th minute, four German players came against two Russian defenders but failed to convert, as the ball shaved the right post of the Russian goal after a kick from midfielder Thomas Brdaric from the edge of the penalty area. Bayer kept on pressing trying to save the match as Spartak relied on counterattacks. With only one minute left to play in regular time, Bezrodny found himself one-on-one with goalkeeper and beat him into the lower left corner of the goal. Two minutes into injury time, Spartak midfielder Dmitry Parfyonov hit the left post on a penalty kick after Spartak defender Yury Kovtun was fouled in the penalty box. About 65,000 fans packed the stands of Moscow's Luzhniki Stadium to support Spartak. Rangers 5, Sturm Graz 0GLASGOW, Scotland (AP) -- Michael Mols, Ronald de Boer and Jorg Albertz scored first-half goals within 30 minutes as Glasgow Rangers defeated Austria's Sturm Graz 5-0 in a Tuesday Champions League first-rotation match. Mols scored in the 9th followed by De Boer's first goal for Rangers in the 19th and Albertz's strike in the 29th. With the resounding victory, the Scottish champions signaled they may be ready to make a serious run at the cup and compete with Europe's other top clubs. Rangers capped off the scoring as Giovanni van Bronckhorst scored in the 71st with Dodds getting his second in the 85th. Olympique Lyon 3, Heerenveen 1LYON, France (AP) -- Olympique Lyon made its Champions League debut by beating Heerenveen 3-1 in a Group C match on Tuesday. Hosts Lyon took control early, with Sonny Anderson scoring at close range in the second minute. Just eight minutes later, defender Max Houttuin netted a corner kick to give Lyon a 2-0 lead after only ten minutes on the field. Heerenveen's solitary goal was scored by midfielder Jeffrey Talan, following through on a precision pass, in the 35th minute. After halftime, Lyon secured their victory with a goal by Steve Marlet in the 59th minute. Lyon came close to scoring a fourth goal in the 83rd minute, when Vikash Dhorasoo executed a magnificent shot but the ball bounced off of Heerenveen's goal post. Arsenal 1, Sparta Pague 0PRAGUE, Czech Republic (AP) -- Arsenal's Brazilian star Silvinho scored in the 33rd minute to give his team a 1-0 victory Tuesday over Sparta Prague in a first-round Group B Champions League match. Silvinho dribbled his way past three Sparta's defenders in the penalty area sending a soft ball into the left corner of Tomas Postulka's goal from close range. Thierry Henry, Arsenal's French star striker, had two good opportunities in the first half but Postulka was there to save both shots. Henry was then replaced by substitute Silvian Wiltord in the 78th minute. Nwankwo Kanu, another of Arsenal's offensive stars, was well covered by Sparta's defense throughout the match. Sparta had the upper hand for most of the first half, but Jiri Novotny failed to score from a corner kick in the 31st minute when his header was saved by David Seaman on the goal line. Marek Kincl had the biggest chance for Sparta in the 52nd minute receiving a right-wing pass alone in front of Seaman in the penalty area, but did not control the ball well enough to score. Veteran striker Horst Siegl then replaced Kincl in the 62nd minute but Sparta did not have enough power to step up the tempo for an equalizer. The match was refereed by France's Gilles Veissiere in front of a capacity crowd of 17,666 spectators. Lazio 3, Shakhtar Donetsk 0KIEV, Ukraine (AP) -- The debut of Ukraine's Shakhtar Donetsk in the Champions League on Tuesday turned to bitter failure as Italian champions Lazio won 3-0 in Group B. Ukrainian goalkeeper Yuriy Virt was caught out of position in the 27th as new signee Claudio Lopez gave Lazio a 1-0 lead. Midfielder Pavel Nedved gave Lazio a 2-0 lead in the 68th, firing above Virt's head while the Ukrainian keeper was too far out of the goal to save it. Ten minutes later, Simone Inzaghi easily scored the third goal from the box. The match attracted enormous attention among fans, who bought up all the tickets in 10 days before the game. About 32,000 Shakhtar's supporters packed the stands of Shakhtar Stadium in the eastern city of Donetsk.
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