The Matchday 9 of La Liga led us to an amazing El Clasico showdown as Real Madrid humbled Barcelona 3-1. Ballon d’Or 2022 winner Karim Benzema gave the team a much needed boost to rout their rival. Follow for more soccer table updates here!
Real Madrid remained unbeaten and topped the La Liga table with 8 wins and 1 draw. While Barcelona is in second place with a record of 7 wins, 1 draw, and 1 loss. Xavi takes the responsibility and plenty of the blame after the defeat, admitting the mistakes and miscalculations during the game. During El Clasico, reactions are quite different, there questionable decisions made, specifically selection of players. Watch soccer online free and live score updates here!
Despite Xavi taking all the blame and making a self-criticism, it is still without a doubt that the defeat of Barca against Real Madrid is still somehow blamed on the players.
The Decline of Sergio Busquets
The 34 year old is clearly regressing. It was very obvious that he lacked speed and power. He became reliable on defense – specifically when Toni Kroos outplayed him that led to the first goal. He was also outrunned by Valverde to score the second and winning goal of Real Madrid
It is very clear that Xavi might make another mixing of players with better chemistry and create better attacks and defense.
Pedri’s exhaustion and Gabi’s absence
The Spanish 19-year-old had a very poor performance against Real Madrid following the Champions League match against Inter. Fatigue caught up with the 19-year-old and Xavi made a huge mistake in failing to detect the fatigue factor. Gavi made his action on the pitch and made an immediate impact. This is another player selection mistake on Xavi’s end.
Raphina and Dembele’s poor performance
Dembele and Raphina started the game as a winger and it became a huge mistake as they failed to generate any single threat against Real Madrid. On the other side, Real Madrid’s Ferran Torres and Ansu Fati made an immediate danger in attack.
The inconsistency of the two Barca Wingers cost Xavi the game. They really failed to translate any single scores and let Real Madrid finess the whole 90 minutes of the match.
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