What is the story about?
Barcelona are back on top of the La Liga table for at least 24 hours thanks to a 4-0 win over Athletic Club on their historic return to the Spotify Camp Nou on Saturday afternoon. The Catalans weren’t exactly at their best but still played well enough and were clinical in front of goal it crucial moments to seal a hard-fought victory against an Athletic side that put up a good fight for an hour before going down to 10 men, and the Blaugrana made a triumphant return to their home in front of 45,000
fans who created a brilliant atmosphere and were sent home very happy.
Reactions & Observations
- A fantastic bit of pressing from Gerard Martín and Eric Garcia led to Barça’s first goal at the new Camp Nou, and of course it was Robert Lewandowski who scored it.
- Athletic had a good response to going behind and their pressing was really effective, and Barça missed Frenkie de Jong and Pedri’s press resistance. Eric can do a job as a defensive midfielder but is not a natural at the position, and Dani Olmo didn’t help him very much either in the first 25 minutes.
- Unai Gómez is not a striker but Ernesto Valverde started him as a false nine for some reason, and that came back to bite him as Unai missed a great chance that a real striker probably scores.
- Nico Williams heard it from the crowd and almost silenced them in what was Athletic’s best chance of the game, but had a pretty poor miss of his own.
- Lamine Yamal with a BEAUTY of a trivela assist to Ferran Torres. And Spain’s number one Unai Simón probably should have saved that one.
- Barça did not deserve a two-goal lead at halftime, but they were just more clinical than Athletic when it mattered.
- Big early goal by Fermín López to make it 3-0, thanks to another brilliant bit of high pressing by Eric Garcia.
- Oihan Sancet was shown the most obvious red card of all-time after a VAR review. It’s weird that the referee gave him a only yellow in the first place. No attempt to play the ball at all. Just kicked Fermín in frustration. Stupid and well-deserved sending off to end the contest for good.
- There was a stretch of 5-10 minutes in which Yamal created chance after chance for his teammates that they couldn’t finish. Should have definitely had more than just one assist.
- I loved seeing Dro Fernández getting more than 30 minutes with the game already over. Bringing on young players in situations like this is a great way to give them pressure-free minutes to continue their development.
- After a bit of a shaky start, Eric was very good in his pivot role and received a deserved standing ovation as he was replaced by Marc Bernal in 15 minutes to go. Man of the Match candidate.
- With 10 minutes to go it was time for Raphinha to get an ovation as the Brazilian made his return from injury. Didn’t take him long to fire a shot on goal from the edge of the box that went just wide of the mark.
- Ferran gets his second of the night, but Lamine’s solo run past a million defenders and the amazing assist are the actual story. The first great highlight of the new Camp Nou comes courtesy of a teenager who will give us plenty more of those in the years to come.
