Rosario Central: match results and statistics

0:1

The hosts fired 16 shots and kept generating chance after chance — on expected goals (xG), their edge looked overwhelming, 1.78 against 0.58 for the visitors. The match still ended in a 0:1 loss for Barracas Central: a goal in the 39th minute turned out to be the visitors' only shot on target all night, while Rosario Central's goalkeeper, by the model's estimate, prevented a result equivalent to almost two additional goals above the normal rate for his position. Per the Bravsen model, a scoreline like this at this size of chance-quality gap shows up in only about 12% of comparable matches — one of the rarest results of the entire round.

2:1

Rosario Central finished with the better expected-goals figure, 1.24 against Belgrano's 1.14, and for most of ninety minutes that edge in quality looked like it might be enough to leave with a point on the road. The model that tracks these matches put the probability of a home win at just 34% given those underlying numbers. It happened anyway, and the reason had nothing to do with the run of play across the full match — it came down to who had something left in reserve when the game was almost over.