Vinicius Junior Smashes Hat-Trick As Real Madrid Thrash Barcelona To Win Spanish Super Cup

Vinicius Junior struck a first-half hat-trick to fire Real Madrid to Spanish Super Cup glory in a thumping 4-1 win over rivals Barcelona on Sunday in Saudi Arabia. Robert Lewandowski scored for Barcelona, who had defender Ronald Araujo sent off in the second half on what coach Xavi Hernandez described as the team's "worst" night. Rodrygo rounded off Real Madrid's rout as they won the competition for the 13th time, avenging last year's final defeat by record 14-time winners Barcelona.

"(Vinicius) needed two or three games to get back to his best level, and he's back to it," said Real Madrid coach Carlo Ancelotti.

The Italian has now gone level with Zinedine Zidane on 11 trophies won at the helm of Los Blancos, behind only Miguel Munoz on 14.

"I'm happy, but now we've got to go for the 12th," Ancelotti told Real Madrid TV.

Spanish champions Barcelona were hoping a victory could kick-start their season, as it did last year, but were left soundly beaten, after Vinicius netted two early goals.

"(I'm) disappointed, sad ... this is football and today we have to deal with the bitter side of the game," Xavi told Movistar.

"We had a lot of hope and excitement going into the final and we've had our worst game of all of them."

Xavi turned to a four-man midfield to try and keep the ball to reduce Madrid's opportunities to counter attack with flying wingers Vinicius and Rodrygo -- it didn't work.

Spain international Pedri started in place of winger Raphinha, who suffered a hamstring injury in the semi-final win over Osasuna.

Ancelotti brought in midfielder Toni Kroos, who like in the thrilling semi-final derby win over Atletico Madrid, was jeered by spectators at the Al-Awwal Park stadium in Riyadh, for criticising players moving to