With football back up and running in the upper divisions in England and in some countries overseas, we resume our round-up of recent highlights for our players on loan at other clubs…
Starting in the UK, in the Championship on Saturday, it was a great restart for Conor Gallagher (pictured top) and Swansea City. They blew away Middlesbrough with three first-half goals, the third of which was a penalty converted by Andre Ayew after Gallagher was tripped in the box.It finished 3-0 at the Riverside with Gallagher playing 81 minutes, and Marc Guehi an unused sub. The Swans are one point and two places outside the play-off zone with a home game against Luton next weekend.The Hatters are fighting for survival and they earned a point in their first game back against the team occupying the final play-off spot, Preston North End. Izzy Brown started and was replaced 15 minutes from time by Callum McMananan, who equalised in the closing stages to make it 1-1.Birmingham look to be one of the few teams in England’s second tier with neither promotion nor relegation at stake, but they proved to be no walkover against top-team West Brom at the Hawthorns, with Jake Clarke-Salter exceptional in the heart of the Blues’ defence. They restricted West Brom to very few clear chances and left with a well-earned goalless draw.
The decision to end League Two based using a points-per-game method meant Josh Grant and Plymouth Argyle could celebrate promotion as the third-placed team in England’s fourth tier.Portugal’s Primeira Liga has been back for a couple of weeks now and Lucas Piazon has played three times already for Rio Ave, twice as a starter, as they have won one and lost two. Piazon played 89 minutes on Wednesday as Rio Ave had three men sent off and conceded a last-minute goal to lose 2-1 at home to Benfica.In Spain, Kenedy has also played three times since the restart, all off the bench for Getafe, who lost to Grenada in their first game and have since drawn with Espanyol and Eibar at home. They are in a comfortable mid-table position in La Liga.Victor Moses was a late substitute in Inter Milan’s draw with Napoli in the Coppa Italia semi-final second leg, missing a good chance to send Antonio Conte’s side to the final. They drew 1-1 in Naples, not enough to overturn a 1-0 first-leg deficit. In Serie A, Inter closed the gap on league leaders Juventus to six points as league football returned in Italy this weekend, with Moses coming off the bench for the final 17 minutes as they beat Sampdoria 2-1 at the San Siro.
Mario Pasalic, who earlier today completed a permanent transfer to Atalanta, played 90 minutes in their action-packed 4-1 return win over Sassuolo at the weekend. The victory bolsters their position in the top four with 12 games remaining, the next of which is against second-placed Lazio in midweek.As part of FIFA plans to extend player registrations until the end of the current campaign, Jacob Maddox has agreed to extend his loan at Southampton until the 2019/20 season comes to a conclusion.