Barcelona registered a 4-1 win over Las Palmas at Estadio Gran Canaria to keep their slim hopes of winning the La Liga title alive. Neymar scored a wonderful hat-trick and was able helped by Luis Suarez, who also got on the scoresheet, to help Luis Enrique’s side maintain their position at the top of the table. Pedro Bigas scored the consolation goal for Quique Setién’s side.
Here are the 5 talking points from the game:
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Lucas Digne is a lucky man!
The clock read 6 minutes when former Real Madrid forward Jese made a run down the left flank and get the better of Lucas Digne to be through on goal. The Spaniard was bearing down on goal, cutting in from the left and had no Barcelona players ahead of him. It was at this time that Digne, in a moment of poor desperation tugged the shirt of the forward and brought him down.
Let’s examine the situation first. Jese was through on goal, with no Barcelona players level or ahead of him making Digne the last man. The Frenchman denied the forward a clear goalscoring chance. Under all conditions, the referee should have given Digne, who was filling in at right-back, his marching orders, instead he only showed the 23-year-old a yellow card. Bizarre!
The controversial decision by the referee infuriated the Las Palmas players who clearly felt they were cheated. The home side were the better team for the first 20 minutes of the game before Suarez and Neymar scored within minutes of one another to squash the hopes of Setien’s side. It could have been a different game and a different result altogether had the referee, José Luis González, shown Digne the red card and forced Barcelona to compete for the majority of the game with a numerical disadvantage. Who knows, the title race could have been over yesterday only?
Neymarvellous
Neymar has received criticism during some parts of the season for his perceived lack of goal-scoring threat, having only scored 19 goals in all competitions this season with 13 out of them coming in the league – a rather paltry sum when you consider his stature as one of the biggest talents in the world of football, or when you compare his numbers to those of his teammates, a certain diminutive Argentine and El Pistolero.
However, Neymar is not just about the goals but also the creativity that he brings to the side, coupled with his nonchalant dribbling and his ability to create something out of nothing. Against PSG, when most of his teammates looked to have given up on the game, Neymar came up with 7 minutes of pure genius to help his side mount one of the greatest comebacks of all time.
The case may not be the same tomorrow but the Brazilian did score his first away hat-trick for Barcelona and provided further proof, not that it was needed, that he is indeed the next biggest thing in football and could well be the successor to Lionel Messi’s throne at Camp Nou but he has a long way to goal for that. Neymar shone on the night, but it was also because Messi had a human game for once, he didn’t score or assist and even didn’t have a telling impact.
Attacking philosophy of Las Palmas is admirable but foolish
For a team who have spent the better part of the season in the bottom half of the table, Las Palmas have an attacking approach to the game and it is this philosophy, admirable it may be but it could prove to be their undoing in the upcoming season, where once again they will be part of a relegation dogfight.
The Canary Islands outfit have scored 53 goals this season, 2nd highest amongst the last 12 teams in the league. Not only that, Setien’s side have scored more goals than 6th placed Athletic Bilbao and are equal with 5th placed Villarreal. However, they have conceded the 3rd most goals in the entire La Liga and are behind only Osasuna and Granada who have been relegated.
Las Palmas’ tendency to stick to their philosophy to attack even in the most difficult circumstances is admirable, to say the least but it could prove to be their Achilles heel next season, when once again they will find themselves fighting for survival and more often than not in these conditions, it does come down to how well a team adapts to the situation and going by how the Estadio Gran Canaria outfit have played this season, it is hard to fathom how they will shun this philosophy of theirs.
La Liga title race is alive, barely
Barcelona currently find themselves at the top of the La Liga table, ahead of title favourites Real Madrid despite being level on points courtesy of a better head-to-head record, albeit having played a game more. The Santiago Bernabeu outfit will their game in hand against Celta Vigo this midweek, which should set us up for an exciting finale of the season.
Barcelona need to win their game against Eibar and hope that Real Madrid either lose to Celta or Malaga, for the Catalans to win the title. If Madrid are able to get 4 points from their 2 games this week, it will not matter if Barcelona win against Eibar on Sunday as the title will invariably go to Madrid, who will be ahead of their arch-rivals on points.
Why Barcelona will lose the title
A lot of reasons can be cited why Barcelona will, or have already, lost the title to bitter rivals Real Madrid. One of them is Luis Enrique’s lack of tactical know-how, the second one being the team’s ridiculous over-reliance and over-dependence on their talisman and arguably the world’s best player, Lionel Messi. However, these are not the reasons why they might end up losing the title to Real Madrid, it will be because of a lack of quality in their squad.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I am not saying Barcelona don’t have quality players, in fact they have a tremendous starting XI. However, they lack the quality in their squad players and this is where Real Madrid, ironically, trump them. Barcelona made the cardinal sin of favouring quantity over quality and this has come back to haunt them. Not that they would have done without the quantity, given that they have a paper-thin squad, just that they needed more quality in their quantity.
Players like Andre Gomes, Lucas Digne, Paco Alcacer and Jeremy Mathieu among others are just not of the required quality for a team of Barcelona’s stature. It has been a result of poor recruitment on the part of the Catalan club coupled with their over-dependence on certain players *cough cough*.
Real Madrid have been able to grind results from games in recent weeks without their stalwarts, including Ronaldo, in the squad on many occasions. It is the quality of their squad players, the Asensios, the Moratas and the Vazquezs, who have proved to be the match-winners and have allowed for the key players to be rested for the bigger occasions. The Camp Nou outfit need to revisit their current strategy ahead of the next season if they are to compete with Los Blancos and not fall behind.
