Day 34
Xavi’s team won 2-1 against a Mallorca that only caused concern at the end and leaves the place in the Champions League almost assured for next season
Barça licked its wounds this Sunday against Mallorca. The team led by Xavi said goodbye to the poor run of results that they had at the Camp Nou and won 2-1 thanks to goals from Memphis Depay and Sergio Busquets in a crucial game in the battle to be in the next edition of the Champions League. The culés, who also experienced the return of Ansu Fati, recover second place with a two-point advantage over Sevilla and extend the distance with Betis, fifth classified, to nine points, waiting for what the Verdiblancos do this Monday against to Getafe.
The triumph of the Blaugranas was a task of attrition. Barça looked more like the team that swept the start of 2022 in some parts of the game and that was enough to go over a Mallorca that faded at the first change. Xavi’s men, much superior throughout the match, took the lead in the first half with a goal from Memphis after a diagonal from the end and sentenced in the second half with a shot from the edge of Sergio Busquets. Those two goals gave three points in a game that still had the scare of the vermilion goal at the last minute and in which the great ovation was given to Ansu Fati who returned to the pitch after three months in the dry dock .
two
Barcelona
Ter Stegen; Dani Alves (Lenglet, min. 89), Piqué (Eric García, min. 28), Araujo, Alba; Busquets, Of Jong, Gavi; Memphis, Aubameyang (Dembélé, min. 75) and Ferran (Ansu Fati, min. 75)
one
Majorca
Majorca: Sergio Rico; Maffeo, Russo, Raíllo, Valjent, Oliván; Sánchez (Save Sevilla, min. 70), Battaglia (Kang-In Lee, min. 70); Ángel (Hoppe, min. 89), Niño (Kubo, min. 60) and Dani Rodríguez (Grenier, min. 60).
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Goals:
1-0: min. 25, Memphis. 2-0: min. 54, Busquets. 2-1: min. 79, Railo.. -
Referee:
Gonzalez Fuertes. He admonished Gavi, Raíllo, Grenier, Jordi Alba and Maffeo. -
Incidents:
Match of the 34th day of the League, played at the Camp Nou in front of 62,789 spectators.
It was an important day for Barça and it showed in the atmosphere. Xavi’s men took to the pitch at the Camp Nou with the dire memory of the defeats against Eintracht, Cádiz and Rayo Vallecano still latent. That haze and the desire to please generated a halfway team, trying to recover the Catalan identity signs and giving wings to a rival who had a clear formula after seeing other teams use it. Javier Aguirre’s team lined up with five defenders and put Ángel and Fer Niño running with the aim of causing a scare. The Mexican’s plan could have worked if the former Villarreal player had been successful in a shot in which Ter Stegen was already defeated.
It was the great opportunity for Mallorca in a first half in which little by little they penetrated the domain of the locals. Xavi’s team does not have the brilliance of yesteryear but manages resources to change the script as it sees fit. Against the vermilion Memphis was the great novelty at the end and his diagonals behind the center backs were a constant to the point of being the solution to end the blockade. The Dutchman took advantage of a mistake by Maffeo to stand alone against Sergio Rico and relieve a Camp Nou that had spent almost a month without seeing his team with an advantage on the scoreboard. That goal opened the ban for a Barça that had already warned before the break with two headers from Aubameyang and Araujo.
After the restart, Barça definitively took off the corset. The culés put a march more to the meeting and left, this time yes, with the knife between the teeth. Gavi and Memphis were able to extend the advantage, but it was Busquets who left the clash seen for sentence, or so he thought, with an impossible shot from the edge of the box for Sergio Rico. The captain’s goal should have been one of calm, but that doesn’t seem to exist at the Camp Nou this year. Not even the return of Ansu Fati, with a thunderous ovation, brought complete happiness to a crowd that once again witnessed a new pájara in defense that allowed Mallorca to close the gap with a goal from Raíllo at the buzzer and revealed once again the vulnerability of a team that leaves the Champions League almost assured but that does it dull.
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