Real, Barca ready for El Clasico?

In his latest column, Guillem Balague compares the recent form of Real Madrid and Barcelona ahead of Saturday’s El Clasico and answers your Twitter questions.

The two giants of Spanish football meet for the first derby this weekend, but have had differing fortunes in recent weeks that could have an impact on the game. 

The Sky Sports expert also looks at the performance of Real Sociedad – who held Barcelona to a 1-1 draw – and takes your questions on El Clasico, Luis Enrique and Malaga’s Javier Ontiveros. 

Real Madrid always manage much better with the psychological side of things. They only need to have good results – they don’t need to have good football – to make them feel strong and that is exactly what they have at the moment.

There is less obsession in Madrid about playing well, it is all about winning, but Barcelona need to play well to win and they haven’t been playing fantastically well recently.

It is not a miracle what Zinedine Zidane is doing. And it is not that complex. They main things I see him doing is having everyone switched on even though at times they lack intensity but when the second-string players like Lucas Vazquez, Nacho and Mateo Kovacic play, they don’t let their team down.

He’s also managed to convince the front players to defend a bit more, which includes Cristiano Ronaldo. He has also been convinced to be mostly a number nine, which he is accepting more than ever, coinciding with having peaked physically.

It is one of the misunderstandings of the things I have been saying in recent times. I have said for nearly two years he has peaked physically, but it doesn’t mean he will stop scoring goals because that’s what he does. He is, of course, influential in the box but not so much outside the box in the build-up.

He is a number nine. Lots of people did not accept his influence – such as assists, defensive work and link-up – is diminishing in the games, but it is now very clear to see. Still, his goals makes him perhaps the best striker in the world. 

Meanwhile, in the 33 games Zidane has been in charge, he is the best coach ever in terms of points per game ahead of Miguel Munoz, Jose Mourinho and Pep Guardiola. They are 31 unbeaten, it is clearly not all luck, and on top of what we have mentioned, he has been dealing very well with absence of players because of injury.

‘Barcelona are getting fewer answers to their collective problems’

This team, as we have been saying for a while, has simplified its resources. It all depends on the front three. The midfielders are runners, they don’t control the games. 

Andreas Iniesta is a big miss but they have players like Denis Suarez who can play a different brand of football. Ivan Rakitic can also do that but Andre Gomes is completely lost. The problem is Luis Enrique does not really believe in that style. Sergio Busquets is struggling for …

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