First Division - Day

Sporting Gijón 0 - Real Madrid 0

Sporting: Cuéllar; Lora, Luis Hernández, Bernardo, Isma López; Sergio Alvarez, Nacho Cases; Carmona (Rachid 86’), Tonny Sanabria, Jony (Alex Menéndez 77’); Guerrero (Juan Muñiz 72’). 4-2-3-1.
Madrid: Keylor Navas; Danilo (Dani Carvajal 84’), Sergio Ramos, Varane, Marcelo; Modric, Kroos, Isco (Kovacic 71’); Bale, Jesé (James 56’), Ronaldo. 4-3-3.

Goals: None.

Yellow cards: Nacho Cases 36’, Carmona 66’, Jony 71’, Sergio Alvarez 74’.

The big two were unable to buck the low-scoring trend on the opening round of the season, Real Madrid playing out the fourth 0-0 draw of the weekend at newly promoted Sporting Gijón. A capacity crowd turned up to see Sporting’s return to the top flight, and although Madrid had most of the play, they were unable to find a way through a packed defence. Ronaldo felt he should have had a penalty midway through the first half, but the closest anyone came to scoring before the break was when Sanabria’s header bounced down off the crossbar onto the line. After the restart Rafa Benítez’s side continued to dominate, but Cuéllar pulled off a couple of great saves from Ronaldo, and the local fans celebrated at the end as if they had won the cup final.