Goal-Fest UEFA Super Cup Match in Tbilisi

Barcelona won its fifth UEFA Super Cup in 5:4 extra-time win over their La Liga rivals Sevilla at Boris Paichadze Dinamo Arena Tbilisi.

All-Spanish UEFA Super Cup between Champions League winner FC Barcelona and the winner of Europa League Sevilla FC was the highest profile football match ever hosted by the Georgian capital.

It also became the highest-scoring Super Cup match ever.

Éver Banega’s free-kick goal gave Sevilla an early lead, but Barcelona’s Lionel Messi equalized on 7th minute from a free-kick from just outside the box. Ten minutes later Messi put Barça ahead after scoring again from a free-kick.

Barcelona led 4:1 after 52 minutes following the goals from Rafinha and Luis Suárez. 

But Sevilla fought back and came from 3 goals behind to take the match into extra time after goals from José Antonio Reyes, Kevin Gameiro, who scored a penalty, and Yevhen Konoplyanka.
 
In the extra-time, when the ball from Messi’s 115th minute free-kick rebounded off the wall back to him, he shot again; Sevilla’s goalkeeper Beto saved, but could not hold the ball and Pedro was the first to reach rebounded ball, sending it into the net from the close range, giving Barça its fifth UEFA Super Cup. Sevilla again gave jitters to Barcelona in last minutes as they missed couple of good chances to equalize.

Attendance at the Dinamo Arena was over 51,000 – a record for UEFA Super Cup since 1998 when the contest became one-off match.

Prime Ministers of Estonia and Romania, Taavi Rõivas and Victor Ponta, respectively, arrived in Tbilisi to attend the match.

Georgian PM Irakli Garibashvili told journalists ahead of the match on Tuesday that his Estonian and Romanian counterparts “will join me as a friend to watch the Super Cup match.”

He said that Georgia “did everything” to host the match in the best possible way. He also said that GEL 20 million was spent on renovation of the Tbilisi Dinamo Arena ahead of the UEFA Super Cup.
 
PM Garibashvili tried to claim credit for his GD coalition government for convincing UEFA to hold Super Cup match in Tbilisi by saying that “final decision” was taken two years ago when then PM Bidzina Ivanishvili met UEFA president Michel Platini.

In fact European football’s governing body UEFA took the decision, selecting Tbilisi as the host of the Super Cup 2015, at a meeting of its executive committee in Kiev on June 30, 2012, when GD was not yet in the government.

Next year’s UEFA Super Cup will be played in Trondheim, Norway, and Macedonian capital Skopje will host it in 2017.