Real Madrid must beat Barcelona on Sunday if they want to stay in the La Liga title race.
Will Ronald Araujo keep Karim Benzema in check on Sunday? image sport
The most interesting game of the day
Sunday’s El Clásico has high stakes for the La Liga title race.
Barcelona and Real Madrid have practically run away from other teams when it comes to winning La Liga. On Sunday, with a win, Barcelona would also very likely knock Real Madrid off their heels at the top of the league.
Before the dawn of Sunday, the teams have a nine-point difference in favor of Barcelona. After El Clásico, both have 12 matches left in La Liga this season.
The straw for Real Madrid in relation to Barcelona is that the team won the first meeting of the season. In the case of equal points, the results of mutual matches decide the order in La Liga, so after a possible victory of Real, the difference between the teams is practically less than six points in the standings.
Barcelona is Xavi goal stick under this season Robert Lewandowski despite the acquisition, a very different team than in previous seasons. Barca, who used to live on their lively attacking game, have been a characteristically rock-hard defensive team this season; so far only 8 goals have been scored in 25 matches for the whole season.
In terms of home matches (12), the team’s balance is a real statistical oddity, as Barcelona have not yet scored a single set goal at Camp Nou in La Liga this season. The balance of the team’s home matches is 10-2-0, goals 25-1. That only goal was scored by Espanyol from a penalty kick Joselu in the New Year’s Eve match (1–1).
The balance of goals conceded in Barcelona’s home matches is also special because the opponents have been able to create a total of 8.7 goals. That can also be interpreted as Barcelona’s luck.
Both teams will enter Sunday’s match with almost their best possible formations. Barcelona are missing a striker Ousmane Dembele and Real Madrid’s all-purpose player David Alaban fitness is a question mark.
Barcelona enters the match technically a little fresher after Real Madrid played against Liverpool in the Champions League on Wednesday. Considering the home match and the fairly calm pace of the game, I don’t count this as a negative for Madrid at all.
In any case, it has no effect on this particular match that Real Madrid continues to play in Europe and Barcelona can only focus on La Liga. Real Madrid’s next Champions League match isn’t until April 12.
An interesting detail about the matches between Barcelona and Real Madrid played at Camp Nou is that, considering all competitions, Barcelona has beaten Real Madrid for the last time in 2018, and even out of the ten previous meetings, Barca has only two wins.
As for the balance of power in the match, I prefer Real Madrid this time as well. When, in principle, only a win is good for it, then the game selections should not be viewed from the side of handicap bets, even if they are of course more often successful.
Veikkaus offers a very competitive 3.60 coefficient for Real Madrid’s victory. That is almost certainly the best game choice for the winner of the match.
Veikkaus also offers El Clásico the market top in terms of goal coefficients. The 1.98 offered for over 2.5 goals also qualifies as a tip.
Barcelona–Real Madrid starts at 22:00.
The best betting tip of the day
Sunday’s best bet search can be found in La Liga. As the first tip, I raise the odds of 1.70 offered for the Osasuna-Villarreal match over 2.0 goals.
Here, one can well assume that Osasuna will try to take advantage of their opponent’s greater match load and go out at home with more courage than usual to challenge Villarreal, who played the Conference League on Thursday, and is four points higher than themselves in the standings. In my opinion, the layout increases the probability of high-goal match scenarios quite a lot.
Osasuna is considered a team with few goals – and yes, it normally is, but only if necessary Jagoba Arrasate due to its material, the group is also capable of a decent offensive game. I believe now is the place for such a blow.
Villarreal’s style of play, on the other hand, scored a lot of goals Quique Setien’s replaced in coaching in the fall Unai Emery’s. This happened mostly with the weakening of defensive play.
Villarreal’s away matches played in the 2023 side have averaged 3.5 goals per game and the expected average of 3.23 goals per game. Based on these starting points, my odds limit for Osasuna–Villarreal over 2.0 goals is 1.65 and the object is valid with its 1.70 coefficient up to the coupon.
Osasuna–Villarreal starts at 17:15.
Games of the day: Osasuna–Villarreal, over 2.0 goals (odds 1.70).
The total balance of the day’s games for the year: 26/48/95%
Every day Iltalehti chooses the most interesting game of the day and the best game destination of the day. You can always find them in the Betting and Ravit section.
