Crvena zvezda grabbed their fourth straight league win on Sunday night, beating Radnički 3-0 in Niš.
Ground: „Čair“
Attendance: 8.000
Referee: Vlado Glođović (Vrbas)
Goalscorers: Vieira 16', Katai 18', 54'
Teams:
Radnički: Konovalov, Bulatović, Stojanović, Popara, Arsić, Petrović, Mrkić, Stanković, Apostolović, Jovanović, Pavkov.
Substitutes: Bajić, Stevanović, M. Živković, D. Živković, Aleksa Jovanović, Radivojević, Krstić.
Crvena zvezda: Kahriman, Petković, Rendulić, Phibel, Ristić, Le Tallec, Poletanović, Kanga, Katai, Ruiz, Vieira.
Substitutes: Supić, Cvetković, Luković, Plavšić, Srnić, Mouche, Sikimić.
It was a fine summer evening at Čair and a fine win for the champions, but it was the home team who's had the first opportunity to open the scoring. Former Zvezda midfielder Saša Stojanović was gifted a chance, but his finish wasn't on target.
Radnički were soon made to pay for their missed chance. Mihailo Ristić crossed hard from the left and in-form Hugo Vieira reacted quickly to put the ball in the net with his chest after 16 minutes of play.
Just a couple of minutes later Aleksandar Katai scored the best goal of the match. He sold a dummy to a Radnički defender, switched the ball to his left foot and curled a wonderful shot from outside the box that went in off the far post. The visiting fans were absolutely delighted with this goal by the captain.
Zvezda were controlling the game for the remainder of the first half even though Radnički had a chance through Arsić. But the game was pretty much finished on 44 minutes when Radoš Bulatović was sent off for the hosts after earning himself a second booking.
Miodrag Božović took Damien Le Tallec off during the break and gave Srđan Plavšić a chance to impress. The visitors scored the third just nine minutes into the second half. Marko Petković provided the assist to that man Katai who applied a classy finish from round 15 meters out to make it Radnički 0 Crvena zvezda 3.
The Belgrade side has had a few more chances through Ruiz, Srnić and Plavšić, but the scoreline remained unchanged until the final whistle.
Not all was good, though, as Thomas Phibel was shown a second yellow five minutes before the end, so Zvezda had to finish the match with ten men.
Next up for Zvezda is a trip to U.S. Sassuolo Calcio in the UEFA Europa League on Thursday.