Barcelona’s flying start to the Spanish league rolls on. They saw off Athletic Bilbao 2-0 at the Camp Nou, banking a valuable three points in La Liga.<\/p>\n
Two stars settled it. Raphinha opened the scoring in the 38th minute after a magical pass from Pedri, and Fermin Lopez wrapped things up with a second (81), handing Hansi Flick a deserved win over stubborn opponents.<\/p>\n
First half: Simon shines and VAR denies Barcelona<\/p>\n
Barcelona pressed early, and Raphinha nearly threatened the visitors’ goal in the opening minute before being flagged offside. Athletic Bilbao hit back fast through Williams in the 4th minute, the winger surging down the left and delivering a ball that Cubarsi cleared for a corner.<\/p>\n
That corner arrived in the 7th minute, a clever pass from Lamine Yamal picking out Anthony Gordon, who stumbled over it. Yamal took his first shot in the 10th minute, a powerful effort that flew wide of Unai Simon’s goal.<\/p>\n
Fermin Lopez orchestrated an organised move in the 13th minute, feeding Eric Garcia and then Lamine Yamal, whose easy ball dropped into the goalkeeper’s hands. Fermin returned to spark another dangerous attack in the 15th minute, slipping in Raphinha, who failed to control it.<\/p>\n
Yamal kept probing. He almost broke the deadlock in the 19th minute with a fierce shot that Simon saved at full stretch, then the post denied him a certain goal in the 24th minute after a well-taken header from Alejandro Balde’s cross.<\/p>\n
Simon stayed razor-sharp in the 26th minute, keeping out another Balde delivery. Pedri then thought he had scored in the 29th minute, only for the referee to rule it out for offside against Lamine Yamal, and Fermin Lopez tried his luck from a direct free kick in the 34th minute after a fine pass.<\/p>\n
Relief came at last in the 38th minute. Pedri threaded a magical pass to Raphinha, who found the back of Simon’s net, before Williams led a dangerous Basque counter in the 39th minute that Marc Bernal snuffed out at just the right moment.<\/p>\n
Yamal spurned the chance for a second in the 41st minute, clean through but denied by a brilliant Simon save.<\/p>\n
You can discuss topics and news in more depth in the “Kooora” forums<\/p>\n
Second half: Yamal’s crossbar and Rodri’s appearance<\/p>\n
Barcelona came out just as hungry. Raphinha almost doubled the lead in the 48th minute when a through ball into the box collided with Bilbao’s defence, and in the 51st minute Lamine Yamal robbed the visitors’ backline and lashed a shot off Simon’s crossbar, the game’s best chance.<\/p>\n
The Basque goalkeeper kept shining, saving his team again in the 54th minute after a fierce Fermin Lopez strike. Flick responded with a double change, withdrawing Marc Bernal and Raphinha for Rodri and Dani Olmo, the former making his first appearance.<\/p>\n
Athletic Bilbao dug in over the following minutes. Lamine Yamal picked out Olmo with a fine delivery in the 67th minute, but the header dropped tamely into Simon’s hands, and Anthony Gordon’s shot in the 72nd minute drifted wide. Still, the win was coming.<\/p>\n
Fermin Lopez struck in the 81st minute. Barcelona’s second killed off Bilbao’s hopes and sealed a deserved victory that underlined their title credentials.<\/p>\n
The closing minutes drifted by without a scare at either end, both sides seemingly resigned to the result despite four added minutes, and the match finished 2-0 to the Blaugrana.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Barcelona’s flying start to the Spanish league rolls on. They saw off Athletic Bilbao 2-0 at the Camp…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":76947,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[1822,92,24578,3368,418,85,94],"class_list":["post-76946","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-barcelona","tag-athletic-bilbao","tag-barcelona","tag-barcelona-vs-athletic-bilbao","tag-f-lopez","tag-features","tag-laliga","tag-raphinha"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76946","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=76946"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76946\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/76947"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}