Ludogorets at the final for the Bulgarian Cup

Ludogorets is at the final for the Bulgarian Cup! In a game on May 24, the Eagles will face CSKA 1948. The champions reached the final match of the tournament after penalties, eliminating Cherno more who defeated them 2:1 away in Razgrad, but in the penalties, the Razgrad players were more accurate - 4:1. This is the first final for Ludogorets since 2017.

The coach of the home team, Ivaylo Petev, could not count on his scorer Igor Thiago who was punished. Instead, Matthias Tissera led the attack. Otherwise, traditionally for the meetings in this tournament, Simon Sluga was in goal, while the starter in the championship, Sergio Padt, started on the bench.

The first good position was for the visitors. After only a few seconds of play, Alexander Vasilev broke through from the left and found Ismail Isa in the penalty area. However, he did not hit the goal. In the 14th minute, Ludogorets could take a big step towards the final. Kiril Despodov crosses from a foul to Igor Plastun, who heads the crossbar. In the 35th minute, only luck saved Cherno more from a goal. Gustavo Nonato broke through the center and brought Tissera out, just before the Argentinian struck, Drobarov made a split. However, the ball ended up in the completely uncovered Spas Delev, who did the more difficult thing and did not hit the goal. The home team still managed to score in the 42nd minute. However, it was rightly disallowed as Olivier Verdon was caught offside when Despodov crossed from a free-kick shortly before Igor Plastun sent the ball into Ivan Dyulgerov's net. It is curious that Ludogorets started with a disallowed goal and the second half. It was realized by Spas Delev, but unrecognized, as the assistant Kiril Despodov was in an offside.

Cherno more took the lead in the 55th minute. Vasil Panayotov was correct. Mazir Sula crossed from the left, Igor Plastun tried to clear with a header, but instead made it easy for Vasil Panayotov, who headed in his second goal in 4 days from close range, having also scored against Spartak Vn. However, Ludogorets responded almost instantly. Kiril Despodov broke through from the left and put the ball on the head of Spas Delev, who chased down Alexander Vasilev and equalized. A breakthrough by Viktor Popov followed, ending with an inaccurate shot by Isa.

Otherwise, shortly after, Ivan Dyulgerov showed his class, knocking out a dangerous shot by Matias Tissera, who was brought out by Despodov. In the 88th minute, Todor Nedelev, who was treating an injury for about 40 days, returned to play for Ludogorets. It was he who could have put an end to the dispute, but his dangerous shot from the foul missed by centimeters. In the next attack, the guests asked for a penalty for a handball by Olivier Verdon, but the referee Radoslav Gidzenov and the VAR referee Dimo Dimov judged that the Benin international did not violate the rules. At the end of the match, Zhivko Atanasov also received a yellow card, which will prevent him from playing against CSKA in the first round of the playoffs.

However, the drama was yet to come. Mateusz Machado somehow sent the ball into Simon Sluga's net after taking advantage of a dropped ball by Daniel Dimov and after a ricochet in Piotrowski, the match went to extra time.

Ludogorets played without a typical central striker, after the unconvincing Tissera was replaced by winger Bernard Tekpetey. It was the Ghanaian who passed for Nedelev, who, however, did not hit the goal. In the 105th minute, Alex Fernandes could have scored a comical own goal after a pass from Nedelev, but the lucky one covered the visitors. 10 minutes later, Ivan Dyulgerov deflected Tekpetey's hard shot from close range. In the 122nd minute Ludogorets requested a penalty for a foul by Mateus Mashado against Bernard Tekpetey, but according to the judge Gidzenov, there was none.

In the penalty shootout, the Eagles scored all four of their shots - Verdon, Tekpetey, Nedelev and Ciao Vidal, until Atanas Iliev hit the goal, Alex Fernandes did, but Simeon Sluga stopped Edgar Pasheko and in the end Cherno more was eliminated.