What is the story about?
Barcelona will finish the weekend in second place in the La Liga table and five points off the top thanks to a 2-1 defeat to Real Madrid at the Santiago Bernabeu in the first El Clasico of the season. Barça were utterly dominated in the first half and could have easily conceded four or five goals in the opening period, but managed to avoid disaster and gave themselves a chance in the second half. Unfortunately the comeback never came, and the Catalans deservedly lost to their eternal rivals in a game
they never had a real chance to win.
Reactions & Observations
- That first half was an absolute nightmare. Barça didn’t have a chance, and found a goal out of nowhere to stay in a game they should have been out of very early. Wojciech Szczesny kept them in it, but Madrid absolutely battered them for the entire 45 minutes plus added time. It’s been a while since we’ve seen Barça get dominated that badly.
- Apart from Rashford and Fermín, Barça’s attack was anemic, unimaginative, and physically dominated by the Madrid defense. Barça were so concerned with keeping the ball and trying to have some control that they forgot about actually doing something with it, and Lamine Yamal was especially poor in his duel with Álvaro Carreras.
- Barça conceded the predictable goal with Kylian Mbappé getting in behind their high line which everyone expected to happen, and Pau Cubarsí’s lack of awareness to track that run was quite poor.
- Pedri needs to shoot more. There were several moments in which he got to promising positions but was instantly looking to pass. In these games scoring chances don’t come around that often, and even someone not inclined to score like Pedri has to try and take them. His (deserved) red card at the death was the unfortunate ending to a pretty disappointing afternoon for Barça’s best player.
- Wojciech Szczesny silenced a lot of critics with his performance. Despite conceding two goals he made quite a few big saves, and his penalty stop against Mbappé was the only reason Barça ever had a chance in the second half.
- Marcus Sorg (and Hansi Flick)’s substitutions came way too late. No subs at halftime was already strange enough given how bad we looked in the first half, but waiting a half-hour to make two safe changes and only bringing on Roony Bardghji with 10 minutes to go was very disappointing.
- Barça deserve some credit for not allowing things to get ugly in the second half, but they offered so little going forward that a comeback never felt realistic, and a 2-1 loss doesn’t do justice to how poorly they looked for most of the game.
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