Barcelona is truly turning their season around. After firing coach Ronald Koeman in October, the Spanish giants have been doing well. Of course, they have been eliminated from the Champions League, while their poor start under Koeman rendered them unable to fight for the title. However, new coach Xavi has done an excellent job of getting the best out of his depleted squad. Youngsters like Nico, Gavi, and Pedri have been great, while January signings have done a good job scoring goals. Now, Barcelona are set to face Galatasaray in the Europa League, so here are three bold predictions about this game.
Barcelona-Galatasaray predictions
Barcelona will finish the job in the first leg
The first leg of this clash will be played at the iconic Camp Nou. This season, even though they have had some disappointing results early, Barcelona has been very good at home. In their last five games at home in the La Liga, Barcelona won four and lost just one, but that loss was to Real Betis, a team contending for the top four in Spain. Their first leg versus Napoli ended in a 1-1 draw at home, but Barcelona was much better in that game and ended up winning the return leg 4-2 away from home. Now, they are facing a much less intimidating opponent in Galatasaray, so there should be no problems.
With all respect due to the Turkish team, they are having a rough season, made even tougher by them drawing Barcelona in the round of 16 of the Europa League. After finishing second in the Turkish championship last season, they are currently 12th, with an incredibly poor run of form. Since the new year came about, Galatasaray lost five games, drawn two, and won just two in their national league. In Europe, they did win first place in their group containing Marseille, Lazio, and Lokomotiv Moscow, earning a bye in the Europa League Play-Off in which Barcelona played Napoli. They should be easy pickings for the surging Barcelona team.
Overall, it is very tough to see the Turkish representatives even scoring in their game versus Barcelona. They seem to be overmatched in every sense of the word. That rings especially true since Barcelona is the best team in Spain since the new year hit, winning five games and drawing two. With no losses in 2022, Barcelona are coming to this clash beaming with confidence and it is not a matter of who will win, but how many unanswered goals will Barcelona score.
Barcelona will score at least four goals
This is a bold statement, but it is not out of the ordinary for Barcelona to score a ton of goals this season. After the early struggles under Koeman, Xavi has found an offensive game plan that really works. In their last five games in La Liga and in their two games versus Napoli, Barcelona have scored a total of 20 goals, including four games with at least four goals scored. That is an incredible record and when we dive deeper into it, it gets even more impressive.
Of course, we can disregard some of these games as easy opponents. Barcelona beat Alaves at home, a team struggling to remain in the first division of Spanish football. Also, they put four past a reeling Valencia team that is really out of form in the last couple of seasons in La Liga. However, it is beyond impressive that they managed to put four past the always rough Atletico Madrid. They also scored four against the usually stable Athletic Bilbao team, just three days after netting the same amount of goals against Napoli, an Italian team. Italians are generally known as stingy and defensive and while Napoli really does not play like that, it is still impressive.
Thus, it would not be weird if we see Barcelona score at least four goals against an overmatched Galatasaray. They could try to completely close the game and maybe Barcelona scores less, but if there is an early goal scored by the Cules, it could be a long and rough night for the Turkish team. They scored early goals against Napoli, Atletico Madrid, and Valencia, forcing these teams to open up and seek an equalizer. It might be a case of scoring early against Galatasaray as well, thus the prediction of four goals scored for the Blaugrana does not seem outside of the ordinary.
Barcelona's midfield will shine again
The headlines in the past few weeks, at least in Barcelona, were taken over by Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. The former Arsenal man has already scored five in six apps for Barcelona, working his way to becoming the top goalscorer of the club, despite joining them in January. He needs four more to catch up to Memphis Depay, the current top goalscorer, but he is well on his way. However, he would not get the opportunities he gets unless the midfield was this good.
When we look at Barcelona's stats this season, it is impressive to see that their player with the most apps is Sergio Busquets. Busquets is an elite defensive midfielder who famously played with Andres Iniesta and Xavi in the legendary Barcelona midfield, considered by many the best in the history of football. Now, he is there to help out the youngsters to reach the same heights their predecessors reached. Nico, Gavi, and Pedri have been great this season and they are the foundation of any future Barcelona title-winning squad.
The most impressive thing about the trio is that they are all under the age of 21. Nico is the oldest, at 20, Pedri is 19, and Gavi is just 17 years of age. Yet, they have played a combined 74 games for Barcelona this season. That number would be even bigger, but Pedri missed some time due to injuries. They will be playing together again in this Europa League clash and while some others might carry more attention by scoring goals, this trio will be the most important part of the game for Barcelona.
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