Belmonte rescues Boca Juniors with stoppage-time winner over Lanus at the Bombonera

Boca Juniors saved it for the very end. At La Bombonera, with a scoreless draw looking all but certain and fans already resigned to checking the clock, Tomas Belmonte showed up in the 92nd minute to fire home a right-footed strike from the center of the box, latching onto a through ball from Santiago Ascacibar, for the only goal of the match. 1-0 final in favor of Boca over Lanus, in Argentina's Primera Division.

There was irony in the result, since the match had opened with a scare for the home side: in the 1st minute, Felipe Pena Biafore nearly put Lanus ahead with a header off a corner kick that crashed off the crossbar. It was the first warning sign from a visiting side that, without much of the ball, created real danger every time it got into the opposing box. Dylan Aquino tried twice between the 14th and 16th minutes without hitting the target, and later in the half Franco Watson rattled the right post before the break. Boca, with Alan Velasco as the main creative spark, piled up shots on the Lanus goal throughout the first half, several corners and attempts from Leonel Flores and Camilo Rey Domenech, without breaking the deadlock. The second half followed a similar script: the introductions of Sebastian Villa, Enner Valencia and Leandro Paredes gave fresh legs to the home attack, while Lanus answered by bringing on Matias Sepulveda and Lucas Besozzi. In stoppage time, with the Bombonera fearing it would go home empty-handed, Allan Wlk nearly spoiled Boca's night with a low shot that the home goalkeeper smothered right at ground level in the 91st minute. A minute later, Belmonte settled the match.

The numbers behind the dominance

Boca was clearly on top in terms of possession and offensive volume, though that edge did not translate into clear-cut chances until the very end.

The big chances column tells a different story than the scoreline: Lanus created three, compared to just one for Boca, and that shows up in our post-match xG estimate, calculated from shot locations: 1.234 for Boca against 1.538 for Lanus. In other words, based on the quality of the chances generated, the match could easily have gone the other way. Belmonte's goal came more from persistence and capitalizing on the visitors' single lapse in concentration than from any clear offensive superiority.

Pre-match projections had favored Boca, giving the home side a 52% chance of victory against 17% for Lanus and 31% for a draw, with expected goals of 1.35 for the hosts and 0.65 for the visitors. The final result ended up matching that forecast on the scoreboard, though the flow of the match, with Lanus generating more and better chances than that projection anticipated, showed a game that was more even than expected.

What the standings show

In Group A, Boca Juniors came into this match with a record of 2 wins, 4 draws and 1 loss in 7 games played, for 10 points, while Lanus had 2 wins, 1 draw and 4 losses in the same number of matches, for 7 points. The gap between the two sides before this game stood at 3 points. With tonight's win, Boca takes all three points, in an outcome, yellow cards for Leonel Flores, Carlos Izquierdoz and Milton Delgado included, that was not settled until the very last gasp of stoppage time.