A late goal from Wu Lei leads to serious drama in Catalan Derby. The year started with a Catalan derby, and clubs could not find out who is the better team. Both teams could score two goals and get one point.
Pre-match preparations
On Friday evening, Valverde met with journalists and talked about the following matches. Spanish coach focused more on the match against Espanyol. Valverde also talked about Spanish Supercopa and mentioned that it’s an essential trophy for Barcelona. As for the match against Espanyol, Barcelona could not get help from Ter Stegen because of injury.
A late goal from Wu Lei changed the direction of match
As you already know, Ter Stegen was unavailable for this match. The German goalkeeper has a knee injury and may be back for the final of Supercopa (if Barcelona qualifies). Keep in mind that Valverde decided to start with Neto as the main goalkeeper. Neto had a good match, but at the last moment, he could not save the team.
Experts criticized Lionel Messi for not trying more. Lionel had a decent match but could not convert two shots into the goal. In the end, Barcelona lost two points because the team could not convert the decisive moments into the goals.
Espanyol could win first half thanks to Lopez’s goal. In the second half, Barcelona started with pressure on the defense of Espanyol and could score two goals in 10 minutes period. Luis Suarez scored the first goal of the year for Barcelona. Arturo Vidal could score the second goal for the year for Barcelona and gave the lead to the team.
Red card that changed the match
Who could believe that Espanyol was capable of scoring a game-tying goal against Barcelona? Valverde believes that De Jong’s red card damaged Barcelona’s last minutes a lot. Players decided to look after the defense and have not attacked since the red card. Wu Lei scored the goal on the 88th minute and changed the result. Barcelona dropped two points in another away match. Valverde was not happy after the game but hoped for a better match against Atletico Madrid.