Sports

|   Sports news from Barcelona and Catalonia  

Barça’s captain Carles Puyol back after 220 days and Messi, Mascherano and Cuenca also declared fit

It’s good news all round today for FC Barcelona, with no fewer than four players returning from injury. Leo Messi, Javier Mascherano, Carles Puyol and Isaac Cuenca are all available for selection by Tata Martino after recovering from their respective injuries. With these four all back, Barça’s boss is now only missing Jordi Alba and Afellay through injury. The FC Barcelona captain, Carles Puyol, hasn’t played an official first team match since March 12, the night of the comeback against AC Milan (4-0). During this time, he has undergone arthroscopy for articular cleansing of his right knee and has also had a Baker’s cyst removed.

October 18, 2013 05:17 PM

FC Barcelona vs Valladolid: Spectacular comeback (4-1)

Jordi Clos

Sensational second half comeback gives Barça their eighth straight Spanish League win, breaking their own record. Alexis (2), Xavi and Neymar turned the result round after Valladolid's opener.Valladolid set a different task for Barça with an early strike and although Martino’s side soon equalised, it wasn’t until the second half that they finished the game off, with an unstoppable Neymar leading the fightback.

October 6, 2013 01:27 AM

Celtic FC vs FC Barcelona: Barça show they learnt last year's lesson (0-1)

ACN

Cesc Fàbregas’ goal gives Barça the win against Celtic, a year on from last season's defeat, when the Scots beat the Catalans 2-1 despite the visitors’ dominating possession.Now, FC Barcelona made the ball their own once again, but with their lesson learnt. Barça patiently probed and looked to open up the flanks through Neymar Jr and the advanced Adriano and it was from the wings that their best chances arose.The win in Glasgow, together with Milan’s 1-1 draw in Amsterdam against Ajax means Barça stay top of the Champions League’s Group H and look favourites to progress to the knock out stages.

October 2, 2013 01:37 AM

Celtic FC vs FC Barcelona: The essence of football

ACN

Barça take on Celtic in the second round of the Champions League group stage in Celtic Park this Tuesday evening (20.45 CET). Martino's men come into the match after securing the best ever start to a league campaign in club history, but they'll be without Messi, who is injured and out of the pitch for the next two weeks at least. Celtic Park is a stadium that Barça know well seeing that the Blaugrana have played there four times in the last decade. The most recent clash between the two teams was played last year, when Barça lost 2-1 in the group stage of the Champions League.

October 1, 2013 02:28 PM

Almería vs. FC Barcecelona: Barça set new record winning seven games out of seven (0-2)

Jordi Clos

Barça's win in Almeria makes this the best ever start to a Spanish League season. Messi scored another brilliant goal on 20 minutes, before going off injured five minutes later. Whatever else happens this season, 2013/14 will go down as a record breaking start to a league season. The boss continued to rotate his squad and left both Neymar and Xavi out of the starting line up, with Cesc, Bartra and Pedro coming in.

September 29, 2013 07:32 PM

FC Barcelona vs Real Sociedad: Barcelona in festival mood (4-1)

Jordi Clos

While the city of Barcelona celebrated the Mercè festival, FC Barcelona made it six wins out of six at the Spanish League with a comfortable victory over Real Sociedad. Barça have equalled the club’s best ever start to a Liga campaign. The first 22 minutes saw a barrage of goals from Neymar, Messi and Busquets, and from then on it was complete dominance from the home side, with the visitor’s solitary goal doing nothing to worry the Camp Nou faithful. Neymar was outstanding with his penetrating runs from the left, and Iniesta was plethoric in an aggressive, dominant midfield in which Xavi and Busquets read every play to perfection. It was the Brazilian who first found the net after just four minutes.

September 25, 2013 11:13 AM

Rayo Vallecano vs. FC Barcelona: Barça’s five wins out of five (0-4)

Anna Segura

Three goals from Pedro, one from Cesc and another great Valdés performance give Barça three more points at the Spanish League campaign. Valdés stopped his second penalty in two games when the scores were just 0-1.It was an even enough first half, with Rayo making some good early chances.Two minutes into the second half, Barça were ahead after Pedro got his second.That made it five wins from five, with next up Real Sociedad at the Camp Nou on Tuesday.

September 22, 2013 08:08 PM

Jorge Pautasso, FC Barcelona’s Assistant Manager: “We'll never take the Barça style away”

ACN

Pautasso was speaking to the press in the place of Tata Martino, who has returned to Argentina for a brief trip following the death of his father. FC Barcelona’s Assistant manager expects Rayo to attack and take risks is a wide open Spanish League match at Vallecas on Saturday. Jorge Pautasso added that the new coaching team are looking to get Barça players generating pressure like they used to. Tata Martino already made it clear that he is not here to change FC Barcelona’s way of playing and Pautasso reiterated the point: “we’ll never take the style away, we have come here to add to, not take away from, what Barça has done so well in recent years. If things go bad for a while and we drop back and regroup, that doesn’t mean we’re playing on the counter attack”.

September 20, 2013 07:33 PM

FC Barcelona vs Ajax: the perfect start in Europe (4-0)

Roger Bogunyà

A Messi hat trick plus a Piqué header from Neymar’s corner kick handed FC Barcelona the three points in their UEFA Champions League debut. Valdés also produced a superb performance: he made two vital saves when Barça were leading 1-0 and stopped a penalty in the later stages. Ajax started in great style but were overwhelmed as Barça grew in strength throughout the match, led by the goals of Leo Messi and the saves of Victor Valdés. The result puts Barça at the top of their Champions League group, tied on points with AC Milan, who beat Celtic 2-0 in San Siro.  The next match will be in Scotland, where Barça lost 2-1 a year ago.

September 19, 2013 01:10 AM

FC Barcelona’s budget for 2013/14 to be 509 million euros

ACN

The Spokesperson for FC Barcelona’s Board of Directors, Toni Freixa, emphasised that there will be a predicted surplus of 36 million euros after taxes for this season. Freixa explained that the additional income had come from sponsorship deals, as well as the transfer of Thiago Alcántara to Bayern Munich. That’s the first time in FC Barcelona history that the budget has been over 500 million, while operating income for last season was 491 million euros, €21 million more than originally budgeted.

September 17, 2013 07:14 PM

FC Barcelona vs Sevilla: Alexis, ensures an in extremis win (3-2)

ACN

An injury time winner from Alexis streched Barça's winning run in the league to 12 games and kept them top of the table. Alves and Messi put Barça ahead, before Seville pulled it back in the last 15 minutes. Neymar put in his best performance in a Barça shirt so far, constantly taunting the Seville defence and setting up Messi's goal. Gerardo Martino gave Cristian Tello his first start of the season, partnering Messi and Neymar in attack, whilst  Xavi returned to midfield alongside Iniesta and Sergio, who had recovered from the injury that kept him out of the international games.

September 15, 2013 09:40 PM

FC Barcelona vs Sevilla: Great chance to continue winning streak

Pau Campaña

Barça are looking to make it 12 points out of 12 in the Spanish League against Sevilla at the Camp Nou (0 pm CET) after the international two-week break. Sergio Busquets has been declared fit and Xavi and Alexis return, but Pedro is being rested, after a fortnight in which eleven of the first team have been away on international duty. However none of them have come back with injuries and there are high hopes for the league leaders against a Sevilla team that so far only have two points in their account.

September 14, 2013 02:46 PM

Read the latest sports news, updates, and analysis from Catalonia, including professional football sides FC Barcelona, Espanyol, Girona, as well as Barça Femení and their team of global superstars including Alexia Putellas and Aitana Bonmatí, as well as major events taking place here like the America’s Cup sailing race, the Vuelta a España cycling Grand Tour, and off-field issues like Barcelona’s Negreira referee payments case and the development of the Camp Nou.