Best odds: 7/10
Bookmaker:
Barcelona will seek to continue their resurgence since the appointment of Xavi Hernandez as head coach when they travel to Elche to face the club bearing the city s name at the Manuel Martinez Valero stadium on Sunday afternoon. The match will be a part of the 27th round of the 2021-22 season in La Liga, though it will actually be game 26 for the Catalans.
Elche
Survival in the Spanish top flight is obviously the main goal of the season for Elche, and at the moment, they re looking very good on that front. They are in 13th place, eight points above Cadiz and Alaves who share places 18 and 19 in the relegation zone.
Things didn t look so promising at the turn of the year, but a number of surprisingly good results since have provided them with a comfortable cushion for the time being. Elche s recent run of form has been very decent with the overall expectations kept in mind. In the last six matches in the league, they beat Villarreal at home by 1-0, won a huge point with a 2-2 draw away to Real Madrid, beat Alaves at home by 3-1, lost 2-0 away to Sevilla, beat Rayo Vallecano 2-1 at home, and eventually lost 3-0 away to Levante.
In that match, Jose Luis Morales and Jorge de Frutos gave the hosts a two-goal lead, before midfielder Gerard Gumbau picked up a red card with 17 minutes to go. In the end, Levante s Gonzalo Melero added insult to injury in the final minute and set the final score.
Having taken a point against Real Madrid, however, Francisco s men will perhaps be hoping for a similar upset when Barcelona come to town, but they won t be feeling any pressure.
Team News
Gumbau is obviously suspended for this match because of the red card he earned against Levante. Midfielders Javier Pastore and John Donald, as well as Helibelton Palacios Zapata, are injured.
Despite the disappointing result, Francisco probably won t feel too tempted to make many changes after the Levante match. Gumbau s place is likely to be filled by Raul Guti, but that s probably it.
Barcelona
It seemed for a while at the start of the season that Barcelona would perfectly depict the fall of a giant, a painful fall at that, but Xavi s arrival in the place of Ronald Koeman seems to have stemmed the tide completely. The team play attractive football again, and the results are finally there.
Having been knocked out of the Champions League, Barcelona beat Napoli to progress through the Europa League play-offs and they will now face Galatasaray in the round of 16 over the next two weeks.
The Catalans slow start to the season had their supporters worried about them qualifying for the Champions League at all next season, but they have broken back into the top four, and that with a game in hand on all of their closest rivals in that race. Many feel that top-four placement is poor a goal for a club of that size, and they obviously have a point, but the 15 points which stand as a gap between Barcelona and their arch-rivals Real Madrid, who top the league, will be extremely difficult to overcome between now and the end of the season.
Barcelona s last-six run within the league stretches all the way back to early January, when they were held to a 1-1 draw away to Granada. During the break that followed, they were knocked out of the Supercopa de Espana by Real Madrid and out of the Copa del Rey by Athletic Bilbao. Then came two victories on the trot, 0-1 away to Alaves and 4-2 at home against Atletico Madrid, before the city derby saw them play a 2-2 draw away to Espanyol. Then they beat Valencia away by 1-4, and conducted a comprehensive revenge on Bilbao by thrashing them 4-0 at the Camp Nou last week.
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Ousmane Dembele, Luuk de Jong and Memphis Depay all hit the back of the net in that match.
Team News
Centre-back Samuel Umtiti (toe), left-back Alex Balde (ankle), midfielder Sergi Roberto and forward Ansu Fati (both hamstring) have been out for a while now and obviously none of them will be at Xavi s disposal on Sunday. Other than that, the former midfielder will have the full squad to choose from.
Dembele, Depay and De Jong all came in off the bench to score against Atletico, but they will probably make way again for Aubameyang, Adama Traore and Ferran Torres in attack.
Conclusion
Barcelona are strong favourites to win this contest and they shouldn t have too many problems in grabbing the three points. The game is likely to be quite open, with plenty of chances and at least three goals.
Verdict: Total goals over 2.5
Best odds: 7/10
Bookmaker:
