BARCA WARY OF KNOCKOUT KINGS REAL IN COPA DEL REY CLASICO
▶ Xavi’s side hold slender lead over their fierce rivals ahead of tonight’s semi-final second leg at Camp Nou
It takes a little over an hour to walk from Camp Nou, iconic home of Barcelona, to the Olympic arena where the city hosted the summer Games 31 years ago.
It’s a pleasant enough stroll, though the last part, uphill, can feel a strain. Barca supporters will need to get used to that climb. Their team will be playing in exile at the Montjuic Olympic venue next season, while extensive remodelling of Camp Nou is under way.
Quite what barcelonistas will be watching in unfamiliar surroundings is anybody’s guess. The defence of a Liga title, almost certainly, given that Barcelona go into the last 11 fixtures of the current campaign with a 12-point advantage over second-placed Real Madrid.
There is a hope, carefully cultivated by club executives, that the greatest player most Camp Nou loyalists reckon they have ever seen in Barca colours, Lionel Messi, might even come back to the club. It is a prospect stirred by Messi hearing boos directed at him at the weekend by some fans of Paris Saint-Germain, where he moved in 2021 and where his two-year contract expires in June.
Messi, 35, left Barca for Paris reluctantly, when he was told he was not longer affordable. He could not possibly be employed, if he returned, on the same vast salary as before, but if Barca can somehow reduce an overall wage bill that already pushes at the boundaries of the Spanish league’s financial fairplay constraints, they might dream on about finding a space for their former captain.
Manager Xavi says he would welcome Messi’s return, and be ready to design a tactical plan that would accommodate the aspects of Messi’s football that PSG’s unhappy fans have begun to criticise, like his limited movement around the pitch when out of possession.
But there are clouds on the horizon, too, even as Barcelona tonight pursue a possible domestic treble in what, under their current relocation plans, could be the last clasico at Camp Nou for some time, Real Madrid the visitors for the second leg of a Copa del Rey semi-final that Barca lead 1-0.
Add the Cup to their probable Liga triumph and the Spanish Super Cup they have already claimed with victory over Madrid in January, and there would be much to celebrate.
But set against that is a failed campaign in Europe, knocked out of the Champions League, then immediately eliminated from the Europa League by Manchester United.
That means they are obliged enviously to watch Madrid continue their defence of the European Cup next week against Chelsea in the quarter-finals.
There will be anxiety, too, that the key player in Madrid’s run to last year’s Champions League final, captain Karim Benzema, may just be hitting the sort of match-turning form that won him the 2022 Ballon d’Or. Benzema scored a hat-trick within
seven minutes during the weekend’s 6-0 demolition of Valladolid and might have added two more goals.
It was reminiscent of his exploits last spring, when he struck three goals in half an hour to turn around a Champions League last-16 tie against PSG. He added another rapid hat-trick against Chelsea in the following round. That sort of sudden impact gives manager Carlo Ancelotti confidence that the 1-0 deficit from the first leg need not seem daunting.
“We don’t need to go crazy, but just be precise and quick in our transitions,” said the Italian. “It doesn’t matter if we score in the 90th or the fifth minute as long as we don’t then concede.”
Facing his third meeting with Barca in less than five weeks, and defeated by a one-goal margin
in the previous two, Ancelotti said: “It’s a high-pressure game and the experience of our veterans is an important factor.”
Luka Modric was rested against Valladolid with the clasico in mind and Benzema taken off with 25 minutes left.
Xavi will be missing some of the pillars of his ideal XI, with Frenkie De Jong doubtful and Pedri, Ousmane Dembele and Andreas Christensen out with injuries and he warned of Madrid’s knack of coming from behind in knockout ties.
“They are used to it, and experienced at it,” said Xavi, “and we will not go into this one feeling we have their measure.
“It’s been a while since they lost a knockout tie, they’re the European champions, but the pressure is more on them than on us.”
There will be anxiety, too, that Madrid captain Karim Benzema may just be hitting the form that won him the Ballon d’Dor