CLASICO: Barca for real!

Midfielder Ivan Rakitic, who was nursing a muscle injury, was included in the team’s starting lineup, as were Luis Suarez and Neymar, who have scored 20 of the 23 goals scored by Barcelona since Messi got injured.

Messi and Barcelona rolled on Saturday.

“We need to get over this result and focus on the next match as soon as possible”, he was quoted as saying by BBC.

“I’ve been really disappointed by Real Madrid”, added Waddle.

Manager Rafael Benitez and team president Florentino Perez have both come under fire following the shocking performance in the season’s first Clasico, and Balague believes Perez will react by booting out Benitez, who had lost just once in 15 games prior to last night’s humbling.

Lionel Messi was fit enough only to make an appearance from the bench, but it didn’t matter for Barcelona. We were superior in the midfield.

“We played a very complete game in every sense, when it came to holding the ball or to look for an advantage up front”, Iniesta said.

Espanyol had been without a win in their last three games, and could have been behind nearly straight from the kick-off as Norin Amrabat went through on goal before seeing his shot well saved by Pau Lopez.

Bravo saved superbly to keep out Ronaldo’s header and Madrid’s evening went from bad to worse when substitute Isco was sent off for kicking Alba as he ran clear in the closing minutes, allowing Barca to ease to an emphatic victory.

“It’s painful for us to lose, and to lose the way we did”.

“Of course it hurts, it hurts a lot to lose like this”, Benitez said. Now we must turn the page and think about the next game. “We were the better team and the win is down to us”, he said. At 52:14 you see Iniesta gain possession of the ball, then play a pass to Neymar.

“We did start how we wanted to”. We managed to that on a few occasions but not on others, and were made to pay for that. The plan was to pick quality players with experience and personality for a game of this magnitude, but things didn’t work out.

I wouldn’t say it had anything to do with attitude.

The hosts could have climbed into the top four with victory and they led through Paco Alcacer’s early goal but Las Palmas, who could have won if they had taken their chances, equalised just before the hour through Jonathan Viera.