Real Madrid striker finally shows up to inspire victory

Real Madrid CF secured a hard-fought 2-0 victory away at Real Sociedad on Saturday evening, and the biggest story of the day is the inspired performance by Luka Jovic. The Serbian was directly involved in both goals for Los Blancos, making himself the unexpected hero of the day after Karim Benzema had to come off due to an injury.

Real Madrid is enjoying the best possible start to a gruelling string of games before Christmas. They had just come off a 1-0 victory against Athletic Club in midweek, and the victory against Real Sociedad is yet another difficult match that they managed to put behind them. However, it did not come easily.

Star forward Karim Benzema suffered a knock early in the match and dropped to his knees on the pitch. He clearly could not continue and Carlo Ancelotti presented Jovic with the massive opportunity to come in at the 17th minute. Prior to this, his last appearance was on November 21, but he was almost always given just a few minutes to wet his toes.

Things were different this time around. With a lot more time to show off exactly what he's got, the Serbian striker showed up to prove exactly why he is a Real Madrid player in the first place, Just after the restart, Vinicius Junior charged towards goal but needed to pass the ball to Jovic. The Serb managed to draw most of the defenders towards himself before flicking the ball back to a now open Vinicius. All the Brazilian needed to do was to tap the ball straight to the back of the net.

A few minutes later, Jovic scored the second goal himself after an acrobatic diving header off a Casemiro pass. He finally showed off the presence of mind and cat-like reflexes that he had been keeping in his back pocket for a very long time. This was his first league goal in a year and nine months, with the last one coming in February 2020 against Osasuna.

Real Madrid are steadily extending the gap at the top of the table with 39 points. Sevilla are trailing eight points behind in second place. Real Betis are in third, with defending champions Atletico Madrid ten points adrift in fourth place with 29 points.