October Clasico – Real Madrid vs Barcelona Preview


This weekend brings the first El Clasico of the season on Saturday night when Real Madrid host arch rivals Barcelona. Unsurprisingly, both teams occupy the top two spots in the league table with Barcelona currently leading with 27 points, three points ahead of Real Madrid.

However it is the hosts who are unbeaten so far this season as Barcelona have only lost once, but Madrid have dropped more points overall as they have had to settle for three draws. Both had important midweek Champions League ties with Real Madrid beating Dortmund 5-2 and Barcelona making light work of beating Bayern Munich, an impressive 4-1 win on Wednesday night.



Carlo Ancelotti celebrated his 200th league game as Real Madrid coach last weekend with a 2-1 win over Celta Vigo and he wants three more points from this home game to draw level with Barcelona at the top of the table. They are currently unbeaten in their last 42 matches and are therefore close to equaling Barcelona’s record of 43 matches.

The Madrid giants are unbeaten at home since April 2023, recorded in 40 matches, with 33 of them wins. Another statistic in their favor is the fact that they have lost only one of the last five league head to heads they have hosted. Of concern for manager Ancelotti is the fact that goalkeeper Courtois and midfielder Rodrygo will both miss this match.

New signing Kylian Mbappe is starting to find his feet in the Spanish capital but last season’s star player, Jude Bellingham, has not been able to perform at his best this season. This will be manager Carlo Ancelotti’s 16th Clasico, so he is far more experienced than his other dugout opponent, Hansi Flick, who will be experiencing this extraordinary rivalry for the first time.



Barcelona and Flick have been encouraged by the return to fitness of Gavi and Fermin Lopez, who both returned to action in the 5-1 win over Sevilla at the weekend. The win was their 13th in their last 14 games in La Liga and they will hope their good form will allow them to avoid a fifth straight defeat against their bitter rivals.

Goals have certainly not been a problem for Barcelona this season, they have averaged 3.5 goals per game in their last four away games in La Liga. They have also scored at least two goals in their last ten games and have scored 33 goals in the league so far this season, a big jump on Real Madrid’s 21 goals. Long-term injuries include goalkeepers Ter Stegen, Ferran Torres, Andreas Christiansen and Ronald Aurajo so they will need to make significant use of their squad of players.

Vini Junior and Raphina both scored midweek hat-tricks in the Champions League so they will definitely be players to watch out for when they clash on Saturday night. Lucas Vasquez and Fermin Lopez both scored in this game last season and they have been in fine form in their respective roles.

Real Madrid have won five of their last ten games and Barcelona have won their last five, so there is very little to choose between the two in recent history. The last draw in a league match came in 2019 when the two played out a goalless draw at Barcelona. These are generally high scoring fixtures with nine of the last ten meetings seeing three or more goals. There have been goals in each half of 12 of the last 13 games so we can certainly approach this game expecting some entertainment.


Last Updated: 10.25.2024



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