La Liga: Espanyol Heading for a Barca Beating

Barcelona vs Espanyol

All eyes will be on the Camp Nou on Wednesday night for the Catalan Derby, La Liga: Barcelona vs Espanyol, and it’s a huge game for both.

This is another must-win game for the hosts and Quique Setien’s men are unlikely to have any sympathy for their neighbours, who know that anything other than a victory will see them slide down into the Segunda Division.

Barca come into the game on the back of a morale-boosting win over Villarreal while Espanyol had another disappointing defeat to 19th placed Leganes to make it five losses in a row.

The pre-match Barcelona vs Espanyol betting odds point to a home win and that would be the end of Espanyol’s stay in the to flight while keeping the Blaugrana’s slim title hopes alive and kicking.

Talking Points

Have Barca blown it?

Three draws in the last five games have put a huge dent in Barca’s title hopes and the latest odds here at SBOBET have Los Blancos in the driving seat, but it isn’t quite over yet. Zinedine Zidane’s side have won the last six, but increasingly narrowly, with three 1-0 wins. The first of those was a narrow victory over Espanyol and the last two have both been courtesy of late penalties converted by Sergio Ramos.

With tricky games to come against Granada and Villarreal Barca must hope their title rivals slip up twice while ensuring they win their last four, starting on Wednesday.

Antoine’s happy at last

Barca were back to their best in their impressive win at Villarreal on Sunday night and Antoine Griezmann put in one of his best performances in a Barcelona shirt since his switch from Atletico Madrid in 2019. He linked up brilliantly with both Leo Messi and Luis Suarez while scoring a stunning goal himself.

The Frenchman’s demeanour hasn’t always been the cheeriest this season and he may have found the experience of playing alongside two of the best strikers in the world a little daunting. But he certainly looked the part in Castellon.

La Liga: With his current form, Antoine Griezmann is expected to be featured in the Catalan Derby — Antoine Griezmann celebrates with Lionel Messi after scoring a brace for Barcelona against Villarreal

There’s another superstar on the way at the Camp Nou. 17-year-old wonder-kid Ansu Fati was on target again on Sunday, his sixth league goal this season and it was the Blaugrana’s 9,000th goal in all competitions. His proud dad Bori Fati puts a lot of the credit at the feet of Messi and with no wonder as the Barca talisman has contributed 630 of them.

Bori says: “Messi is Ansu’s soccer father; he is the father of every soccer player because there is no other like Messi. If you are next to Messi you have to be very happy and thank God because there is nothing better than that.”

With a Champions League campaign to follow the La Liga season, there’s still plenty of action for all four of Barca’s strikers to look forward to.

Bye Bye Espanyol

The league table doesn’t lie. It’s going to be very difficult for either Leganes or Mallorca to escape the drop, but 11 points from safety with four games to play the writing are on the wall for Espanyol. Defeat to Leganes last week pretty much sealed the deal and as Barcelona haven’t lost in any of their last 42 home matches, Espanyol head coach Francisco Rufete needs a miracle.

Los Periquitos have always been in Barca’s shadow, while they have spent most of their existence in the top flight, Espanyol have never featured in the Champions League. Can they beat Barca? Well it’s 11 against 11 and in Raul de Tomas and Wu Lei the underdogs have lively strikers, though the loss of influential forward Jonathan Calleri, who is suspended, is a blow to their already severely limited hopes.

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History

Can we find any reasons for Espanyol to be cheerful? Well, the head to head Barcelona vs Espanyol results won’t help!

The Blaugrana have plundered 42 victories and 15 draws from the 63 games played since 1994 with Espanyol winning only six.

A 2-2 drawback in January, thanks to an 88th minute Wu Lei equaliser which came shortly after Barca midfield ace Frenkie de Jong received his marching orders.

Since their inception into the Spanish football league in 1900, Los Periquitos have spent 80 seasons in the top flight. They aren’t serial trophy winners, bagging just four Copa del Reys and no league titles in their history, but they are part of the furniture.

This could be their swansong, for a while anyway, as they enter the lions’ den without a win in six, and without a victory over Barca in 13 matches.