El Clasico Luka Modric Eric Garcia Carlo Ancelotti Xavi Hernandez Toni Kroos Jules Kounde Federico Valverde France Spain Brazil Football La Liga soccer win El Clasico Luka Modric Eric Garcia Carlo Ancelotti Xavi Hernandez Toni Kroos Jules Kounde Federico Valverde France Spain Brazil

Real Madrid go top after win over Barcelona

breakingnews.ie

Karim Benzema, Federico Valverde and Rodrygo were all on target as a dominant Real Madrid beat old rivals Barcelona 3-1 at home in "El Clasico" on Sunday to move top of LaLiga.

The defeat was another blow to Barca and manager Xavi Hernandez after they were left on the verge of Champions League elimination following a draw with Inter Milan in midweek.

Real are now on top of standings on 25 points, three ahead of Barca. Real boss Carlo Ancelotti said on eve of the game that he was not going to reinvent the wheel as he sought to avoid a repeat of the result between the sides in March, when he put midfielder Luka Modric up front only to get hammered 4-0 by the Catalans.

There were no surprises in his lineup as he left it to his Barca counterpart Xavi to get inventive. He left midfielder Gavi on the bench and, aware of the danger that in-form Vinicius Jr presented from the left wing, decided to start Sergi Roberto as a full back on the right and rush back defender Jules Kounde, who has recently been nursing a hamstring injury, to cover the Brazilian.

Related News
Real Madrid limped back to the top of LaLiga despite dropping points for only the second time this season after being held to a 1-1 draw at home by lowly Girona.
NEWCASTLE: If anyone in the Premier League remained in any doubt after last week, Newcastle United underlined to their rivals that they are very much part of the top flight party.
Leipzig earned an impressive 3-2 victory over Real Madrid on Tuesday in the Champions League to inflict the holders' first defeat of the season and flex their muscles ahead of a decisive showdown against Shakhtar Donetsk next week.
Karim Benzema celebrated his Ballon d'Or win this week with a goal in Real Madrid's comfortable 3-0 win over Elche on Wednesday night, in which they also had three strikes disallowed for offside. Fede Valverde and Marco Asensio scored the other goals as the La Liga leaders cruised to victory. Benzema, though, was the star turn: he hit the back of the net three times in total but had two scratched off while David Alaba also had an effort ruled out. It has been a spectacular week for Carlo Ancelotti's side.

Latest News

Change privacy settings
This page might use cookies if your analytics vendor requires them.