A comprehensive, blow-by-blow recap of FC Barcelona's stunning 6-0 home win over Granada CF as goals from Neymar (3), Lionel Messi (2) and Ivan Rakitic secured a comfortable victory for the La Liga leaders
FC Barcelona returned to winning ways on Saturday evening at the Camp Nou, eradicating the memories of their midweek goalless draw with Malaga CF by crusing to a comfortable 6-0 win against Joaquin Caparros’ Granada CF. Up until midweek, Granada were unbeaten in La Liga and up until tonight, they could boast the third best defensive record in the league, yet Barça made it look easy.
After being gifted the first goal courtesy of an error from Hector Yuste, Barça grew in confidence and effectively ended the game with a quickfire double just before half-time, as Ivan Rakitić added a second before Neymar completed his brace. The points may have been secured, but Barcelona continued to push forward in the second half and got their reward as Lionel Messi helped himself to a brace of his own, while Neymar, not to be outshone, completed his hat-trick.
All in all, a thoroughly effective display from the league leaders.
Barcelona | Granada | |
Possession | 69% | 31% |
Total Shots | 19 | 9 |
Shots on Target | 12 | 1 |
Pass Accuracy | 89% | 79% |
Corners | 8 | 1 |
Fouls | 11 | 11 |
Offsides | 3 | 6 |
Yellow Cards | 1 | 2 |
Red Cards | 0 | 0 |
Following the disappointment of a goalless midweek draw with Malaga CF, Luis Enrique made a plethora of changes for the visit of Granada CF, rotating his entire backline and making one change apiece to his midfield and frontline. That meant recalls for the likes of Dani Alves, Javier Mascherano and Jeremy Mathieu, while Xavi and Munir were also handed starts ahead of Andrés Iniesta and Pedro respectively.
Would this much-changed Barça line-up be able to improve upon their last outing and ensure the Blaugrana maintained their slender lead at the top of La Liga?
***
Barça started the match well, and while it was obvious that the Blaugrana would be on the front foot against Granada, it was encouraging to see Barcelona causing so many problems early in the match. After all, we struggled to muster a single chance in 90 minutes at La Rosaleda, so the fact that we forced two early corners had to be seen as an improvement.
Naturally, those corners didn’t come to anything but from open play, Barça were looking dangerous. A fabulous cross from Dani Alves found Jeremy Mathieu in space at the far post and while the cross was too close to the byline for Mathieu to go for goal himself, the Frenchman could cushion the cross back across goal where Munir was waiting in a central position, anxious to break the deadlock.
It seemed impossible to miss, but perhaps Messi’s pass was a little behind its intended target and as a result, the young forward couldn’t direct his effort on target; a great chance had been squandered.
A few minutes later, Barça managed to get the ball in the back of the net and the deadlock was seemingly broken, until a late flag from the assistant referee ruled otherwise. It was another smart move from Barcelona as Dani Alves switched play from the right-flank to find his compatriot Adriano Correia marauding forward. Rather than take his man on, Adriano tried an early cross and found Lionel Messi ghosting into space for the finish; replays suggested that Messi was level with the last man but these things often work both ways, so we can’t complain too much.
Plus, it wouldn’t ultimately matter as Barcelona continued to create chances and before the half-hour mark, they made the breakthrough (again). It all stemmed from a poor back pass from Hector Yuste who undersold his teammate such that he allowed Neymar to pounce, and one-on-one with the Granada defense, he feinted one way, feinted the other and surprised everyone by going for goal. Granada’s defense reacted accordingly, blocking Neymar’s effort but the damage had been done – they could only deflect his shot and that was enough to take it over Roberto and into the back of the net.
Despite threatening in their rare ventures forward, Granada were struggling to deal with the Blaugrana and sure enough, Barcelona were able to translate their dominance into another goal, effectively killing the match off by half-time with their second of the match. Dani Alves was involved, as was Munir but the creator was Lionel Messi who used his trickery to get past his marker and drive to the byline, where he stabbed in a cross to find Ivan Rakitić unmarked for a glancing header into the far corner for his second in a Blaugrana jersey.
Granada were shell-shocked, and Barça were ready to move into overdrive. On their next attack, they scored again – Lionel Messi was running at the Granada defense and played a slide-rule pass to find Munir. One-on-one with the goalkeeper, Munir couldn’t quite get his shot away quick enough and was smothered by Roberto, only for the ball to kindly fall into the path of Neymar, who duly dispatched the ball into an empty net. 90 minutes without a goal and now we’d seen three in just 45 minutes. Not bad guys, not bad at all...
***
Joaquin Caparros reacted to that first-half display by removing two of his more ineffectual players: Hector Yuste was replaced after his errant pass led to Barça’s first of the night, while Fran Rico was also withdrawn after he picked up a yellow card in the first-half. Luis Enrique on the other hand was more than happy to keep his starting XI out on the field with the game all but over as a contest.
The start of the second-half reflected that fact too; the points had already been won and as such, it was simply a case of how hard Barça wanted to push for a fourth or fifth goal.
The first real chance of note in the second-half fell to the Blaugrana, unsurprisingly, as Lionel Messi was felled just outside the area, right of centre. In essence, it was prime "Leo Messi" location for the free-kick and we all expected the Argentine to go for goal, but instead Xavi stepped up and tried his luck, forcing an incredible save from Roberto who had to claw the Catalan’s effort off the line and clear from danger.
Moments later, Barcelona were attacking, again, and Lionel Messi, again, was the catalyst, sliding through another great pass to set Munir free down the right. Displaying the poise and composure of a veteran forward, Munir clipped the ball towards the far post and in truth, his shot probably deserved to go in but it just rolled wide of the target. Agonisingly close, yet so far for the talented forward.
With the match approaching the hour mark, Lucho began to ring the changes. Ivan Rakitić was withdrawn to a standing ovation, replaced by Sergi Roberto after the young midfielder signed an extension to his current deal this week.
However, while Roberto was the freshest face in the Barça midfield, it was Xavi who was pulling the strings in typical fashion. Granada gave the legendary midfielder too much time in a central position and he made them pay dearly, lifting the ball over the defense to find Dani Alves’ immaculate run and the Brazilian turned back the years to hit a first-time cross back across goal to find Messi lying in wait to head home Barça’s fourth of the evening.
Now four goals to the good, Lucho took this opportunity to make his second change, replacing Sergio Busquets with Marc Bartra, meaning that Mascherano moved forward into pivote for the first-time in a long time. Not that we needed a holding midfielder against this Granada attack...
Xavi was running the show, and before long, his magic helped created Barça’s sixth. Adriano knocked the ball inside, and again Xavi was given time and space to do his thing. Big mistake. He found Messi with a reverse pass and while he was in an odd position on the left, Messi looked right at home and found Neymar with a cutback. The Brazilian had already scored twice, so it was hardly a shock to see him keep his composure and wrong-foot pretty much everyone by slotting the ball into the near corner of the net.
Manita complete – how many more could we muster?
Neymar nearly got another with a curler from the edge of the area, before Lucho made his final change of the evening – off went Munir, as Sandro was given a little more experience with the first team. Another personnel change, yet nothing really changed in the game. Barça pressed forward, had a few more chances – Messi and Xavi each forced a save before the former was presented with another chance courtesy of another mistake from the Granada defense.
Jeison Murillo was responsible this time, hesitating in possession just long enough for Messi to pounce and pick his pocket. No-one could chase back, no-one could cover for this mistake – Messi was one-on-one with Roberto and of course, there was only ever going to be one outcome – goal number five of the season for Leo.
Content with our night’s work, we stopped scoring from that point onwards, conserving energy for Tuesday’s crucial UEFA Champions League clash with Paris Saint-Germain. Until then, Visca el Barça!
| Roll Call Info | |
|---|---|
| Total comments | 585 |
| Total commenters | 50 |
| Commenter list | Abdul95, AdeshMessiah, Anders Thomassen, Antonio Moreira, Barca Boy, BarcaLifer, BartraFTW, BoodHernandez, Born Blaugrana, Bostjan Cernensek, Catalan_Blood, Eddie Pundell, El_Illusionista, FCB4Ever, GoBarca, Harshiv, Inder Methil, KiwiBarca, Neyssi, Petter Premberg, Rajesh1101s, RexRegum, Ricardo Blonde, Staralfur, Steven Cordero, Tazo, TheOnlyPtolemy, ThreePar, Tokjee, Uncharted_Almo, UnderConstructionCule, VarkeychanT, Yuro_Doosh, barca96, craig00000, culeforever, david.james, defeaning_silence, gimme alredy, hdp78, imran raad, justdoit94, lord.supertramp, messism, msalmanz, shubham2806, syredeathtrooper, uday kakoti, user2468, waseem10 |
| Story URLs | |
| # | Commenter | # Comments |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | BoodHernandez | 73 |
| 2 | ThreePar | 63 |
| 3 | Bostjan Cernensek | 57 |
| 4 | Anders Thomassen | 43 |
| 5 | craig00000 | 42 |
| 6 | Uncharted_Almo | 39 |
| 7 | syredeathtrooper | 34 |
| 8 | TheOnlyPtolemy | 34 |
| 9 | Yuro_Doosh | 25 |
| 10 | hdp78 | 20 |
| 11 | El_Illusionista | 16 |
| 12 | imran raad | 12 |
| 13 | AdeshMessiah | 11 |
| 14 | waseem10 | 9 |
| 15 | Abdul95 | 8 |
| 16 | BarcaLifer | 7 |
| 17 | Born Blaugrana | 7 |
| 18 | Steven Cordero | 6 |
| 19 | shubham2806 | 6 |
| 20 | Ricardo Blonde | 5 |
| 21 | barca96 | 5 |
| 22 | messism | 4 |
| 23 | Antonio Moreira | 4 |
| 24 | defeaning_silence | 4 |
| 25 | KiwiBarca | 4 |
| 26 | FCB4Ever | 4 |
| 27 | VarkeychanT | 3 |
| 28 | lord.supertramp | 3 |
| 29 | Rajesh1101s | 3 |
| 30 | Staralfur | 3 |
| 31 | RexRegum | 3 |
| 32 | Eddie Pundell | 2 |
| 33 | gimme alredy | 2 |
| 34 | user2468 | 2 |
| 35 | GoBarca | 2 |
| 36 | BartraFTW | 2 |
| 37 | uday kakoti | 2 |
| 38 | david.james | 2 |
| 39 | culeforever | 2 |
| 40 | Barca Boy | 2 |
| 41 | UnderConstructionCule | 1 |
| 42 | Catalan_Blood | 1 |
| 43 | Neyssi | 1 |
| 44 | Petter Premberg | 1 |
| 45 | justdoit94 | 1 |
| 46 | msalmanz | 1 |
| 47 | Inder Methil | 1 |
| 48 | Tazo | 1 |
| 49 | Harshiv | 1 |
| 50 | Tokjee | 1 |
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