Celta top Leganes in La Liga

A lone goal in the first half by Iago Aspas turned out to be enough here for hosts Celta to beat Leganes 1-0.

The outcome leaves each club with 17 points after 13 matches and hovering just above mid-table in La Liga on Friday, reports Efe.

Besides extending their losing streak to four, Leganes lost three players to injury during the course of the contest: Ezequiel Muñoz, Dimitris Siovas and Darko Brasanac.

Celta played their usual possession game, but Leganes held their shape and limited the chances for the home side until a poor clearance by Muñoz created an opening for Aspas, who missed the target.

The Spain international let loose again a few minutes later only to see visiting goalkeeper Ivan Cuellar to deliver his best stop of the first half.

At the other end of the field, Ruben Blanco was equally impressive turning aside a cross from Raul Garcia on a set-piece for Leganes.

The hosts remained on the attack and a childish foul in the box by Leganes midfielder Erik Moran set up a penalty conversion by Aspas to make it 1-0 in the 27th minute.

Blanco swatted away a potential equalizer seconds later, while Cuellar had to make stops against Aspas and Gomez to prevent Celta from taking an even bigger lead into the dressing room at half-time.

The visiting side showed more ambition going forward after the break and came close to making Celta pay for their failure to score a second goal.

Alexander Szymanowski's strike in the 75th minute had Blanco beat, but the post intervened in Celta's favor.

Celta fumbled two more chances to give themselves a cushion and remained in danger of dropping points until the final seconds, when Leganes forward Miguel Angel Guerrero failed to put the ball into the open net.

--IANS

sam/vm