Sevilla 2 Granada 0: Ganso double piles pressure on Atletico

Ganso grabbed a brace as Sevilla drew level with third-placed Atletico Madrid in LaLiga after a 2-0 victory over lowly Granada at Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan on Friday.

With a top-three spot bypassing next season’s Champions League play-off round, Sevilla and Atleti have been battling for third place for months – Diego Simeone’s men pulling ahead in recent weeks.

But Jorge Sampaoli’s side hit back here, scoring at the start of each half through Ganso, with the first goal arriving after Vicente Iborra had kick-started a dominant performance by striking the crossbar.

Ganso forced a fourth-minute finish past Guillermo Ochoa at the near post and Stevan Jovetic then saw a goal disallowed for a marginal offside call.

Pablo Sarabia narrowly missed with Sevilla’s next effort and Joaquin Correa headed too close to the goalkeeper, before the second finally arrived after 46 minutes when Ganso turned a low cross home.

46′ | GOOOOOAAAAAAL! @phganso bags his second to double the lead!#SevillaFC 2-0 @GranadaCdeF_en #vamosmisevilla #SevillaFCGranada pic.twitter.com/XDpezkSoUM

— Sevilla FC (@SevillaFC_ENG) April 21, 2017

Ochoa smartly denied Ganso a hat-trick moments later and another very harsh offside flag ruled out Correa’s strike, but the hosts cruised to victory to put pressure on Atleti, who travel to Espanyol on Saturday.

The result leaves Tony Adams’ Granada seven points from safety with five matches left to play.