Barcelona bring out fans to bear witness to A-League Men talent

When Barcelona took the stage to face the A-League All Stars on Wednesday night they were met with a spectacle worthy of a grand final. Flames and fireworks ignited as Barça chants echoed around Accor Stadium. For a moment, as the players lined up, the Catalans in their signature blue and maroon and the home side in their Madrid-esque white and gold, it was easy to forget that this was a friendly.

The reality was a little less romantic. Still fresh from a 2-0 end-of-season defeat to Villarreal, the travelling side had been on Australian soil for barely 36 hours before kick-off. Their opposition had been frantically assembled from the pool of players not involved in this weekend’s A-League Men grand final. The group, coached by Dwight Yorke, managed to train as a team just twice.

Nevertheless, the match was marketed as an exhibition of footballing excellence and the fans came in their droves – a touch over 70,000 were in the stands in what was the biggest turnout at a sporting event in Sydney since the Covid-19 pandemic began.

Coach Xavi had promised the best of Barça and his line-up did not disappoint; Ousmane Dembélé, Sergio Busquets and Dani Alves all started as promised, with the likes of Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Jordi Alba and Frenkie de Jong featuring off the bench.

The game itself, which on paper should have been a cakewalk for Barcelona – despite the rigours of the trip at the end of a long, hard season of top-flight European football – proved a decent contest and the makeshift All-Stars team, featuring a healthy dose of young blood, made a good impression on the visitors in the 3-2 defeat.

“I have to congratulate them because they played so good, so good,” Xavi said afterwards. “I think it was the main goal