SERGIO Busquets has described Barcelona’s plans that led to their superb 3-1 victory over Real Madrid in the Spanish Super Cup in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia last night.
Barcelona eased to victory with goals from Gavi, Robert Lewandowski and Pedri, while Karim Benzema scored a late consolation for the La Liga and UEFA Champions League champions.
Barcelona were dominant throughout the game and took advantage of three mistakes by Real Madrid to score.
Xavi, Barcelona’s manager, switched things up by deploying an extra player in midfield with only Lewandowski up front, while Ronald Araujo was at right-back to try to stop the tricky Vinicius Jr.
“We strengthened the midfield to look for taking over that area and Araujo was really good stopping Vinicius counters, we left them with no options and felt very comfortable,” Barcelona captain Busquets told Movistar Plus in his post-match interview.
“We knew that it was an opportunity that we had to seize, we are going through a time of changes in the club and in the dressing room and this win will strengthen us to continue fighting for more titles.”
A dominant Barcelona opened the scoring in the 33rd minute after Antonio Rudiger lost possession to Busquets, who began a move that ended with Gavi all alone inside the box to score with a left-foot strike.
Lewandowski doubled the lead 12 minutes later on the break when Dani Carvajal was caught out of position and Barcelona worked the ball to the Poland strike to finish.
Real Madrid made another costly mistake in the 69th minute that allowed Barcelona to score when substitute Dani Ceballos lost the ball in midfield and Gavi crossed for Pedri to fire point-black into the empty net.
Benzema scored a consolation goal for Real Madrid in added time, firing home on the rebound after Marc-Andre ter Stegen stopped his first attempt.
