Videoton comfortably beat Sporting Lisbon

	Videoton FC - Sporting Lisbon 3-0 (3-0) Sostoi stadium, Att: 10,120 Goalscorers: Vinicius (16), Oliveira (21), Nikolics (36) Videoton: Bozsovics – Brachi, Vinícius, Caneira, Stopira (Renato, 89.) – Tóth, Mitrovics – Walter (Gyurcsó, 68.), Sándor, Oliveira – Nikolics. (Torghelle, 78.). Sporting: Rui Patrício – Rinaudo (Van Wolfswinkel, 30.), Rojo, Boulahrouz (Adrien Silva, 71.), Pranjic – Izmaijlov, Fernandes, André Martins, Jeffrén Suárez – Labjad (Schaars, 45),

It was a historical night at the Sostoi stadium on Thursday evening, not only for the club but for the town itself. Vidi were making their Europa League group stage debut against Portuguese giants Sporting Lisbon. No one could have predicted the outcome of the match beforehand. The night ended up belonging to former Sporting player Paulo Sousa. The stadium was close to full, and the supporters welcomed their favorite side out in spectacular fashion, as the photo below shows.

Both teams spent the opening moments testing the other, with the atmosphere inside really impressive. Vidi began to take the upperhand after around 5 minutes, which eventually resulted in the red and blues going ahead after 16 minutes. Fine combination play ended with the ball at Oliveira's feet, who crossed into the middle, where Nikolics headed at goal. The keeper made a good save, with the rebound falling to the alert Vinicius who stabbed the ball home from close range. Rojo had the first effort for Sporting two minutes later. His shot was well saved by Bozsovics in the Videoton goal, before things got even better as Vidi doubled their lead. Walter escaped down the right and his good cross found the head of Oliveira, who planted it into the corner of the net, giving the keeper no chance.

Sporting manager Sa Pinto sent on Dutch player Van Wolfswinkel to try and get his side back into the match in the half hour mark. That meant that the Portuguese were relying on a two man strike force to break down the Vidi backline. This allowed the home side to get more of the ball in the middle, which they used to good advantage. The third Videoton goal of the first half arrived following a bad defensive error. Vidi striker Nikolics remained alert to intercept a bad back pass, before bending the ball beautifully into the far corner of the net to send the Sostoi in to raptures. The 3-0 scoreline was an amazing achievement and Vidi continued to press in search of more.

Sporting made another change at the break, as they tried to shake things up. However, they were to remain frustrated with the way the second period panned out. The Portuguese side's attacks failed to threaten the home goal. They did have a very big chance after 58 minutes when Van Wolfswinkel shot wide of goal from 5 meters out. It needed a brave save from Bozsovics after 65 minutes to keep out Viola's effort from close range. Jeffren Suarez then aimed for the bottom left hand corner of the net a minute later, but once again the giant Montonegro keeper was equal to it. Sporting's back line were penetrated again after 73 mimutes, with Nikolics once more on hand to try his luck at goal. However, the keeper made a last minute save to keep the score at 3-0. The Mexican wave was being enjoyed my the majority of supporters inside the stadium. The great European evening was proving memorable, with Balazs sending an 82nd minute shot over the bar, after Sandor had set things up nicely for him.

Sporting were relying on the long ball towards the end, but could find no way past Bozsovics. The evening did have a sour note after 88 minutes. Defender Stopira suffered an injury and had to be stretchered off to the waiting ambulance. Just as he was receiving treatment for his injury, Vinicius almost made it 4 at the other end, as he just failed to connect with a low cross from the right. The team produced a really good performance to go in to second place in the table, following the 2-2 draw in the groups other match between Genk and Basel. Two more home matches await in October and November, and Videoton have shown that they know how to handle a big night of European football.