Saturday - 18 November 2017 16:15 Barcelona Time Estadio Butarque Previous Meetings SLL 19-02-2017 FT Barcelona 2 : 1 Leganés SLL 17-09-2016 FT Leganés 1 : 5 Barcelona VISCAELBARCA
Extremely important game. Not much FIFA virus since most of the players didn't have serious games except rakitic who is also almost qualified. Leganes has been playing great and they like to have possession and dictate play. It is a potential banana skin and last year we almost drew with them at the camp nou with Messi doing a last minute penalty to win. We also have a difficult away game at Turin mid week and I want to see if ev will bench Iniesta or play him for sixty minutes. I do see Paulinho and rakitic starting and possibly delofeu too.
Rakitic looked good in Zagreb and Piraeus. Hope he starts in this one irregardless of the Juventus match coming up as confident, happy players should be played as much as possible. Plus there were six days between games.
Play on words by Leganes, "Botarem" we will jump is mimicking "Votarem" we will vote which was a slogan of the independence referendum. Given that Leganes is a Madrid suburb and that Madrid has harshly responded to the voting, I don't think that this is in very good taste: http://www.marca.com/en/football/barcelona/2017/11/11/5a071385268e3e97338b465d.html
Mascherano out for about 4 weeks, and meanwhile Umtiti and Pique are on 4 yellows in Liga play, an extra one gets them suspended a game. So it looks like there's a good chance that Vermaelen will get some rare playing time at some point in the next 4 weeks.
He just played in the recently international friendly correct? Hopefully he doesn't pick up a bad case of DVT on the flight back.
Yeah, he played the full 90 minutes of both friendlies this past break so should be good to go. Though obviously his injury history with Barca makes reliance on him a concern.
So 3 away matches in-a-row? Ugh! Longer-term, away games @ Juve, @Valencia, @Villarreal and @LPB all before Christmas. We'll know how good this Barca team is by then.
Squad list for the match: Ter Stegen, Cillessen Semedo, Piqué, Umtiti, Vermaelen, Digne, Alba Sergio Busquets, Rakitic, Iniesta, Paulinho, Denis Suárez Aleix Vidal, Messi, Luis Suárez, Alcácer and Deulofeu
Ter Stegen Semedo, Piqué, Umtiti, Alba Sergio Busquets, Rakitic, Iniesta, Paulinho Messi, Luis Suárez, somehow i feel that our coach will not play this formation , let's see.
One booking away from suspension: Piqué, Umtiti Carrying three yellows: Alba, Busquets Upcoming Liga fixtures: J13 (A) Valencia J14 (H) Celta J15 (A) Villarreal
Would be about time for Messi to score again. I have no doubt Penaldo will suddenly score a hattrick against ATM and would be great if it meant nothing for Penaldo. [emoji23]
Suarez looks troubled after that challenge. His knee.. I hope skipping the surgery does not prove to be costly.