Alvarez, Correa net braces as Atletico thrash Sparta

Argentina forward Julian Alvarez and substitute Angel Correa scored two goals each while Marcos Llorente and Antoine Griezmann added to the feast as Atletico Madrid thumped hosts Sparta Prague 6-0 in the Champions League on Tuesday.It was a commanding performance from the Spanish side, who earned their sixth successive win in all competitions with arguably their best performance of the season. Atletico are ninth in the 36-team Champions League table with nine points from five games while Sparta Prague are 28th on four points.Atleti dominated proceedings from early on at the Letna Stadion with Alvarez and striker Alexander Sorloth a constant menace, combining well up-front.Visitors opened the scoring in the 15th minute when Alvarez curled a free kick from the edge of the box into the top corner. Sorloth was denied a second goal when his strike was well saved by goalkeeper Peter Vindahl a few minutes later. However, Llorente extended the visitors’ lead just before the break with help from Sorloth, who played a clever dummy on his teammate’s cross that ended up evading everyone, including the goalkeeper, as it bounced in at the far post.Alvarez scored the third in the 59th minute, finishing off a counter attack that he started in Atletico’s own half, playing a fine one-two with Giuliano Simeone before firing past the goalkeeper.Griezmann came off the bench to score the visitors’ fourth with a tidy finish from inside the box from an assist by Llorente in the 70th minute, before Correa twice struck late from inside the box to wrap up an easy win.AC Milan overcome Slovan BratislavaAC Milan earned their third successive Champions League win with a 3-2 victory at Slovan Bratislava , hanging on after the home side sought to stage a late comeback. Milan arrived on the back of a 3-1 win at Real Madrid while Slovan were beaten 4-1 by Dinamo Zagreb last time out in the tournament, but for much of the game the home side looked more than capable of causing their visitors real problems.The first half ended level with Milan’s Christian Pulisic opening the scoring in the 21st minute before a quick counter-attack led to Slovan’s Tigran Barseghyan equalising three minutes later.Milan struggled to put Slovan away before substitute Rafael Leao put them back in front in the 68th minute and Tammy Abraham capitalised on a horror back-pass from David Strelec to extend their lead three minutes later.Slovan pulled a goal back through Nino Marcelli in the 88th minute, and also had Marko Tolic sent off late on, but Milan came through the late drama to move on to nine points. Slovan, with no points, remain rooted at the bottom of the standings.