Wednesday night saw Barcelona begin their 2026/27 Champions League campaign with an emphatic win over Dutch giants Feyenoord. The Catalans were looking for a fifth straight win in all competitions and romped to victory, bagging another five goals along the way.
Let’s check out the talking points from the game at Camp Nou.
Defending from the front
Right from the first whistle, we saw what Barcelona we were going to get in the pouring rain. Within seconds of the kick-off, Raphinha was chasing down the opposition.
The captain
continues to set the example, and it was poetic that he should open the scoring with his seventh goal of the season already (adding an eighth just before the hour).
Barca’s attack, however populated, is not allowing their opponents a moment’s peace on the ball, and the skill, power and pace that the Brazilian, Karim Adeyemi and Lamine Yamal bring to the front line, not to mention Anthony Gordon and Gabriel Jesus, is making life that much easier for the midfield and defence.
Can Barca maintain their sensational early season form?
It’ll generally take most teams at least half a dozen games before you begin to see anything approaching what might be expected of an XI.
Despite having a number of players that were still representing their country at the World Cup until the last possible moment, Barcelona as a collective haven’t shown any signs of either mental or physical tiredness.
One might question why there should be any lack of effort so early in the campaign in any event, but when you’re effectively playing all year round, there’s no guarantee that players will now hit the ground running from game one of a new season.
However, that’s exactly what Barca as a squad have done. Five games played in all competitions, five games won, 22 goals scored, and three conceded.
It doesn’t really get better than that.
The big question now is whether Barca can keep this up for the long-term, but with a bigger squad and more options for Hansi Flick to use, there are plenty of reasons to be excited.
Christensen shows his best side
He’s one of the unsung heroes of the team, but Andreas Christensen rarely put a foot wrong against Feyenoord.
The towering Dane offers a calm and experienced presence at the heart of the back line, which perfectly complements Pau Cubarsi.
As Hansi Flick now finds in several positions within the squad, players can be rested – in this case, Gerard Martin – with no downturn in terms of quality from the replacement.
In defence particularly, Barca have rarely had those kinds of options available to them, and it may well be that defensive excellence is what propels them to success as much as attacking brilliance.
