Barcelona made it nine wins in their first ten La Liga games of the season on Sunday evening by beating Sevilla 5-1 at the LluÃs Companys Olympic Stadium.
Doubles from Robert Lewandowski and substitute Pablo Torre, as well as a strong strike from Pedri, were enough to secure a comfortable win for Barca, who face the first Clásico of the 2024/25 season. The League season in good form.
The result goes Barça three points ahead of arch rivals Real Madrid after week 10.
How the game developed
Barcelona absolutely dominated during the first exchanges, but were kept at bay by a stoic Sevilla defense until the 21st minute.
Then Sevilla’s defense finally wilted under the pressure. Raphinha was hauled down by Gerard Fernandez inside the penalty area, and Robert Lewandowski would obviously make no mistake with the resulting spot-kick, sending the keeper the wrong way to make it 1-0 and score already his 13th goal of the season. .
Shortly after it was 2-0.
The second would come from Pedri, who finished off a superb Barça move by firing the ball into the top of the net after being found by Lamine Yamal on the edge of the area. An impressive goal all around.
It probably should have been three in the 35th minute when Yamal made a wonderful pass to the clinical Lewandowski pass inside the penalty area. Amazingly, after controlling well, Lewa saw his subsequent effort save Orjan Nyland in the Sevilla goal.
Lewandowski made amends just three minutes later, reacting quickly to head home a Raphinha effort from the edge of the area to score his second, and Barca’s third, of the game.
Yamal almost added an impressive fourth early in the second half, forcing Nyland into a decent save with a low effort from the edge of the box. Raphinha, though he had added a fourth moments later after running and firing into the back of the net, was nevertheless offside when scoring and the goal was rightly disallowed.
The fourth finally, deservedly, came in the last ten minutes of the game. This time, Jules Kounde was the provider from the right, finding substitute Pablo Torre with a cut-back cross before the youngster saw an effort deflected into the net.
The final, and biggest, cheer of the night from the Catalan crowd was saved for Gavi’s return to action after almost an entire year without competing due to injury. The youngster came on for the last five minutes of the game.
Sevilla would pull a goal back before the full-time whistle, with youngster Stanis Idumbo Muzambo flicking on a long ball before diving into the penalty area to fire home his first La Liga goal.
Barca’s lead would not be reduced for long as Torre popped up with his second of the game, seeing a set piece from the right wing go across the face of goal and into the back of the net .
GK: paint ink – 5/10 – He worked hard with the little he had to do at night.
RB: Jules Kounde – 7/10 – He set up the fourth of the game and was a constant offensive threat down the right wing.
CB: Pau Cubarsi – 7/10 – He’s hardly put a foot wrong, as evidenced by his 98% pass rate.
CB: Inigo Martinez – 7/10 – Classy outing once again for the defender.
LB: Alejandro Balde – 6/10 – He looked at his best on Sunday. It is slowly rising after a long period on the sidelines.
CM: Peter – 8/10 – He scored an impressive goal in the first half and hardly put a foot wrong afterwards either.
CM: Marc Casado – 6/10 – He kept things going in midfield completing 90% of his passes.
RM: Lamine Yamal – 8/10 – As effective as ever on the right, Yamal made his sixth assist of the season with a smart pass to Pedri for Barça’s second.
AM: Raphinha – 7/10 – The game captain produced a typical Raphinha 2024/25 performance, causing plenty of problems with his clever movement and use of the ball.
LM: Ansu Fati – 5/10 – His first Barca start in a long, long time and he didn’t do much to make the most of it, looking a little off the pace at times.
ST: Robert Lewandowski – 9/10 – He was simply unplayable in the first half, scoring his 13th and 14th goals of the season and linking the game expertly. Still one of the best around.
Substitutes
SUB: Pau Victor (65′ for Lewandowski) – 6/10
SUB: FermÃn López (65′ for Raphinha) – 6/10
SUB: Gerard Martin (76′ for Yamal) – 6/10
SUB: Pau Torre (76′ for Fati) – 8/10 – He came in and scored two. You can’t ask for much more than that.
SUB: Gavi (85′ for Pedri) – N/A
Manager – Hansi Flick – 7/10 – Barcelona look 10 times the team they did under Xavi Hernandez last season, and much of that is down to the positive influence Hansi Flick has had on the squad.
