5 Things we learned from Barcelona’s thrashing of Elche to open their La Liga season
Hansi Flick’s side picking up exactly where they left off. It’s been a relatively quiet summer for Barcelona with a lot of their players just coming back from their break following the World Cup but they laid a marker for the rest of the teams in the league tonight, Barca looked dangerous going close just five minutes in with Yamal’s close-range effort going effort but just ten minutes later they opened the scoring after Raphinha was brought down in the box Victor Chust with the Brazilian stepping up and cooly slotting the penalty into the side netting. It took until added time in the first half for Flick’s side to grab their second as Yamal found Raphinha inside who then slipped Adeyemi in with the German finishing well with his weak-foot past Dituro to double Barca’s lead heading into half-time. Anthony Gordon was brought on midway through the second half and it didn’t take him long to make an impact playing a splitting ball through to Raphinha who grabbed his second of the match with a lovely near-post finish to seal the three points, Fermin Lopez got in on the action a few minutes later as Elche got caught yet again playing far too high a line with Anthony Gordon running clean through on goal and unselfishly squaring the ball to the Spainard who made it 4-0. We did have time for one more goal as Xavi Espart played the ball into Fermin Lopez in the box who turned brilliantly and fired past Dituro on his left-foot to make a five-star performance from the La Liga holders, statement sent.
That’s exactly the start Barcelona would have wanted to La Liga, with Real Madrid winning late on yesterday it was important that Barca followed suit with a win themselves and they did so in convincing fashion putting five goals past a pretty helpless Elche side. The first half was a bit sloppy at times in midfield but with Elche playing a pretty comical high line it was only a matter of time before Flick’s side started to create chances and the first goal along with the second comes from their captain Raphinha, he would have been absolutely gutted to get injured in the group stages at the World Cup missing the knockouts but he looks to have had a solid pre-season and will be leading the line until Barca get a number 9 at some point between now and next Tuesday. The same can be said for Fermin Lopez who had to watch all his Spanish teammates lift the World Cup over the summer having missed the tournament through injury so he’s got huge motivation this season along with Raphinha to push Barcelona towards more major trophies, although Barca won 5-0 a lot of the talk mid game and after has been Lamine Yamal’s performance which I do think was under par but blown way out of proportion. He’s had one pre-season game to prepare for the season and probably was always going to be taken off relatively early because he’s not match-fit, Barca can clearly cope without him for the start of the season so I don’t see why we need to have constant pictures of him on the bench throughout the game. Just let the kid get up to speed for the season, he’s obviously going to start performing sooner rather than later.
What were Elche thinking with that high-line tonight? I couldn’t really believe what I was watching at times tonight as Elche’s defenders pushed towards the halfway line in Barca fashion but without the players to do so, especially in the second half when Anthony Gordon came on and exploited the high-line over and over grabbing two assists within about ten minutes of coming on. I get Martin Anselmi is a young coach and wants implement a certain way of playing but it was always going to end in disaster against a rapid Barcelona frontline, I suppose only time will tell whether his ideas come across long-term for Elche but they certainly didn’t work tonight.
Pedri the difference maker yet again for Barcelona. It was a bit scrappy in that midfield in the first half with Gavi and Bernal but as soon as Pedri came on everything just flowed so much better, it was an interesting summer for him initially starting for Spain in the group stages but then getting benched for Fabian Ruiz in the knockouts which obviously did work for De La Fuente. It did mean that Pedri was bound for the bench for the rest of the tournament but he did make a big impact in the final coming from the bench to eventually help Spain over the line in extra-time, he had no goal involvements today but if you watched the second half you’ll know how big of an impact he had on the game and I can’t help but salivate at the thought of Rodri and Pedri playing together week in week out in Barcelona’s midfield. Is this the year that Barcelona get over the line in the Champions League? With that midfield I wouldn’t bet against them.
Any more business to do before the end of the window? There is certainly some business left to do for Barcelona with the first one being a striker of some sort coming in, we saw the reception Julian Alvarez got at the Metropolitano today with boos ringing around the stadium but can Barcelona afford his signature at this point of the window? It’s hard to know where else they would look but yet again we saw Georges Mikautadze perform for Villareal today so that’s where I would be looking if I was Deco and Laporta, I still think they need a centre-back as well but it that really feasible with just a week left in the window? They are two players off being the Champions League favourites in my opinion but those two players are mandatory and are a huge part of the spine of the team, can Barca work some magic in the window before it closes? Only time will tell.