FC Barcelona look to reduce Real Madrid’s gaping 15-point lead over them in La Liga when the two arch rivals meet in El Clasico at the Bernabeu on Sunday night.
Trounced twice by Los Blancos this season and in all of their last five showdowns, Barca and their coach Xavi Hernandez are all too aware that “results against Madrid haven’t been good recently” and want to put this right.
“We view this as a good chance to do so,” Xavi added. “But Madrid are the league leaders and are playing at home, so they have to be the favourites.”
Without Karim Benzema, who Xavi called “certainly one of them” if not “the best center forward in Europe”, Madrid are slightly weekend but Xavi insists that the Frenchman’s absence “doesn’t change our approach”.
“Madrid are chameleonic,” Xavi explained. “You don’t know if they’ll push forward or keep it tight as a unit. It’s hard to know what to expect. We just have to try to keep the ball and impose our ideas but we’ll need to be prepared for anything.”
While October’s loss at Camp Nou was one of the most one-sided 2-1 matches you’re ever likely to see, a Super Cup defeat in Saudi Arabia in January which went to extra time was far tighter.
“We competed against them in the Super Cup and could have won. Since losing to Bayern Munich (in the Champions League) we have been getting better and more competitive with every game,” Xavi said, with Barca now averaging 3-4 goals a game and seeing off big teams such as reigning La Liga kings Atletico Madrid and Galatasaray away in the Europa League a couple of days ago.
“I won’t make big changes for this game,” Xavi vowed, stressing he was “very clear about my plan”, which we’ll see “tomorrow”, or rather on Sunday – though he did complain that the team has “hardly had any time to train since Thursday” when they won in Turkey.
If Xavi isn’t going to tinker with his starting XI too much, then, it is expected to look as follows with Marc-Andre ter Stegen in goal as a back line of Jordi Alba, Ronald Araujo, Gerard Pique and a Dani Alves playing his 400th FC Barcelona game protect him.
In midfield, captain and pivot Sergio Busquets looks to supply a youthful Gavi and Pedri with Frenkie De Jong rested as Ferran Torres, Pierre Emerick-Aubameyang and Ousmane Dembele form the attack and aim to unsettle David Alaba and Eder Militao. (FORBES)
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