La Liga Match Preview: Barcelona Vs Elche

Written By Onyeka Daniel

Barcelona lost their first game of the season to German side, Bayern Munich in the group stage of the UEFA Champions League and would be looking to put that disappointment behind them when they face Elche in the Spanish League. The Blaugrana would be keen to get a positive result against their visitors as teams would be going on international break after this weekend’s game.

Of course, the club knows that they can’t just make that leap in quality in just one season, but the way and manner with which they lost to Bayern shouldn’t be happening and hopefully, Xavi Hernandez would have corrected those mistakes, especially the part where the team failed to convert their chances, before they were punished for it.

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Overall, it’s been a good start to the season and it can only get better, starting with a win in this game. Elche, on their part haven’t had the best of start to the new La Liga season, as they occupy the bottom position on the table after 5 games, with just one point to show for it and recently, a group of fans stormed Elche’s training on Tuesday demanding a reaction.

Facing Barcelona couldn’t have come at a worse time for the club and it could all go downhill from here or they can turn around their season with a spirited performance from this game and maybe, a point. But in their last four games against Barcelona, they’ve conceded at least, two goals or more and they haven’t kept a clean sheet this season either. Coming against a Barcelona side that scores an average of three goals in the games that they’ve scored and won, it will be a hard task grabbing a point from this game for the away side.

Style Of Play

With a full squad available to the coach, expect him to play the usual 4-3-3 formation with an intent to attack for the better part of the game. We could even see a slight tweak in system, to commit more bodies forward and try to break down the opponent’s defensive wall.

The full-backs will surely be joining the attack more while the defensive midfielder, either Frenkie De Jong or Sergio Busquets will help to recycle attacks with Pedri and Gavin tasked with moving the ball from the midfield to the final third. Francisco Rodríguez, the coach of Elche, will have a lot of work to do as he would have to factor in the opponent’s attack before choosing his preferred formation for this game.

He will probably go with the 4-2-3-1 formation to help his team stay compact in defense and also be able to mount occasional counter attacks to try and get a result from this game.

Recent Form

Barcelona have played 5 league games and 2 UCL games and have only lost once and drawn once with five wins in between and they’ve scored an average of three goals in those five wins, so one should expect them to score two or more goals in this game. For Elche, they’ve just one point after five games, which was their 1-1 draw against Almeria, while losing to the likes of Athletic Bilbao (4-1), Villarreal (4-0), Real Sociedad (1-0) and Real Betis (3-0). It will be hard for them to keep a clean sheet in this game.

Head To Head

Both teams have faced each other 11 times in recent years across all competitions and Barcelona have 10 wins with just one ending in a draw, (0-0), which was in 2014. Barcelona have scored an average of two goals against Elche in all of their meetings.

Players To Watch

Polish striker, Robert Lewandowski will be looking to put the bad game he had against his former team in the UCL behind him, where he failed to convert the chances that he had and will be getting support from the likes of Raphinha and Ousmane Dembele.

On loan Barcelona winger, Alex Collado will be keen to prove himself against his parent club and having scored one of the two goals scored by Elche this season, will be looking to add to his tally this season at the familiar grounds of the Spotify Camp Nou.

Injuries And Suspensions

Barcelona have almost a full squad available, with only Sergi Roberto out with injury. For Elche, they would have to do without the trio of P. Lirola, O. Mascarell and P. Milla for this game.