Barcelona aim to finish year on a high with Celta Vigo win

The Catalans can maintain their lead heading into the winter break with a win over Celta Vigo.

Barcelona are performing well on all three fronts, but they’ve lacked their usual robustness defensively. Three clean sheets in a row in the league has brought some confidence back to the team after they conceded 19 goals in the 13 games before that. There’s nothing wrong with their attacking output, though, as they’ve scored 46 goals in the league already — far ahead of Sevilla and Celta Vigo in second and third place with 29 and 28 goals respectively.

Celta manager Miguel Cardoso has started his tenure in promising fashion with seven points from four games, although Celta fans are likely to be wary considering Antonio Mohamed’s reign also started well. Barca are the first side Cardoso will have faced from the top half of the table, so this will be a proper test of his methods. The recent return to form has seen them climb up the table and they currently sit just four points outside the European places.

Celticos have been a tough test for the Catalans in recent seasons with three wins and three draws in the last 10 games between the sides, but only two of those matches were at Camp Nou. 5-0, 5-0 and 6-1 are just some of the recent scores Barcelona have racked up against the Galicians. Only one of the last five games between the two has had less than four goals and the offensive firepower both teams possess means this is likely to be high-scoring.

Ernesto Valverde made a rare formation change in the last match against Levante as he used a 3-5-2 system due to Nelson Semedo’s injury with Ousmane Dembele playing in the wing-back position. They struggled to assert control over the game at first, but defensive mistakes from Levante allowed them to build a lead and they settled in the second half to come away with a 5-0 win. However, they’re unlikely to stick with this formation, especially now that Thomas Vermaelen is out injured, so the usual 4-3-3 should be expected.

Cardoso appears to have settled on a 4-4-2 setup after initially utilizing a 4-2-3-1. Sofiane Boufal and Brais Mendez act as inverted wingers with Maxi Gomez the attacking focal point and Iago Aspas in a free role to support him and linking up with the other attackers. The 4-4-2 shape ensures they have a strong defensive platform to work from and it complements the team well because they have attackers capable of making the difference.

The key player for Barcelona will be Lionel Messi as usual; teams have to plan around negating his influence, although they are rarely successful. Luis Suarez adds some much-needed verticality to the side as well as a tireless work-rate which makes Barca’s counter-press more effective; his willingness to run in behind allows Ousmane Dembele and Messi the chance to receive the ball between the lines due to the defense being stretched and their passages of play lacking predictability.

Celta will be reliant on Aspas to be the link between the different attackers while Gomez is the target man so they need him to act as an outlet in order to ensure they aren’t under constant pressure otherwise Barcelona will find ways to break them down and the score could get ugly very quickly.