{"id":2485,"date":"2026-04-12T09:06:20","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T09:06:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/2485\/"},"modified":"2026-04-12T09:06:20","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T09:06:20","slug":"barcelona-superstar-makes-a-pointed-dig-at-espanyol-after-critical-win-time-to-swallow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/2485\/","title":{"rendered":"Barcelona superstar makes a pointed dig at Espanyol after critical win \u2014 \u201cTime to swallow\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Barcelona made it five consecutive derby victories over Espanyol on Saturday, brushing aside their city rivals 4-1 at the Spotify Camp Nou in matchday 31 of LaLiga.<\/p>\n<p>The result moved Hansi Flick\u2019s side nine points clear of Real Madrid at the top of the table, with seven games remaining.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>What made the win all the more impressive was the context surrounding it. Sandwiched between two Champions League quarter-final legs against Atletico Madrid, Flick showed little interest in rotation.<\/p>\n<p>He fielded a near full-strength side and demanded maximum intensity throughout. The dressing room\u2019s reaction at full-time said everything about how much this group, stacked with homegrown talent, cares about derbies.<\/p>\n<p>Lamine Yamal\u2019s dig at Espanyol<\/p>\n<p>Nobody embodied that more than Lamine Yamal. The teenage sensation was the <a href=\"https:\/\/barcauniversal.com\/yamal-10-torres-9-barcelona-4-1-espanyol-player-ratings\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:game\u2019s standout performer;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;game\u2019s standout performer&quot;}\" class=\"link \">game\u2019s standout performer<\/a>, contributing a goal and two assists in a display that was full of energy from start to finish.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>Hours after the final whistle, he made his feelings known on social media.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBarcelona is blaugrana!! It\u2019s time to swallow, as always,\u201d Yamal wrote on Instagram, accompanying the message with a photo of him celebrating his goal.<\/p>\n<p>The post drew responses from fellow academy graduates Marc Bernal, Marc Casado and Fermin Lopez, all of whom replied with emoticons.<\/p>\n<p>Gavi, another product of La Masia, also took to social media after the final whistle and quickly pivoted to Tuesday\u2019s task at the Metropolitano.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOne more year the derby is Barca! Now all together for Tuesday\u2019s comeback, we will give our lives, that\u2019s for sure!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Barca head to Madrid needing to overturn a 2-0 deficit from the first leg to reach the Champions League semi-finals. The league, for now, is firmly in their hands.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Barcelona made it five consecutive derby victories over Espanyol on Saturday, brushing aside their city rivals 4-1 at&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2486,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[179,549,92,187,93,931,728,930,938,224,83,720],"class_list":{"0":"post-2485","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-barcelona","8":"tag-atletico-madrid","9":"tag-barca","10":"tag-barcelona","11":"tag-champions-league","12":"tag-espanyol","13":"tag-fermin-lopez","14":"tag-gavi","15":"tag-hansi-flick","16":"tag-lamine-yamal","17":"tag-marc-bernal","18":"tag-real-madrid","19":"tag-spotify-camp-nou"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2485"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2485\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2486"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}