Preview: Athletic – Barcelona, Sunday 1pm EST, GolTV

By: Isaiah | October 18th, 2008

Well, I’m back, so my previews are also back. Yay. Just remember, my record is 100% in terms of predictions,* so you can trust me to give you the real low down.

So we travel to Bilbao, where we’ll meet up with both Athletic and the historic Estadio San Mamés, known locally (and perhaps nationally) as La Catedral. It’s named after a saint, after all. Wikipedia being such a great tool to disseminate information, I learned today that Saint Mammes, as he is known in English, was thrown to the lions by the Romans, but instead of being devoured, Mammes befriended the lions and became BFF with one, who followed him around after that; now Athletic is known as Los Leones (the Lions). So that explains that, huh?

The stadium itself holds 40,000 fans — and with a 99% attendance rate, it really does — and I’m sure they’ll be making quite a bit of noise when the blaugrana make their appearance. But will it matter? After all, Athletic are a fairly small club compared to Barcelona. It would stand to reason that, without looking at anything regarding the season so far, that Barcelona should leave with a win. It’s just that in La Liga, nothing is that simple and certainly can’t be taken for granted.

Let’s look, then, at how Athletic stacks up to Barcelona via a handy little side-by-side comparison:

Note that Athletic’s home record mirrors Barça’s away record; Barça’s goal differential is only as large as it is because of the 6-1 drubbing they gave Gijon — without it they have a GD of 0.

They don’t have a leading scorer, really since all 4 of their goals have been scored by different players. Leo Messi alone has more goals than all of Athletic put together, as does Samuel Eto’o. They have also racked up a lot of yellow cards, so expect a physical game. If they don’t bring it physically, it’ll be a blowout.

Let’s turn to Barcelona now, a team on a 4-game winning streak. They’ll be lining up without Xavi, but with a few players returning from injury. Here’s the complete squad:

Valdés, Pinto, Alves, Víctor Sánchez, Puyol, Márquez, Piqué, Abidal, Sylvinho, Busquets, Touré Yaya, Keita, Iniesta, Bojan, Hleb, Henry, Eto’o, Messi.

So here’s my guess for starting 11: Valdés, Alves, Puyol, Márquez, Abidal, Busquets, Keita, Iniesta, Hleb, Eto’o, Henry

I know, I know, I’ve left both Touré and Messi out, but that’s because the former is coming off an injury and probably isn’t 100% and the latter got back to Barcelona late. Plus, squad rotation. Or something. Whatever. Don’t question my almost random alignment players! That’s what Guardiola seems to do, anyway. He’ll probably come out with a different defensive lineup, but it’s hard to ignore Henry’s contributions this week for France.

So, we’ll take them on and we’ll probably beat them if they decide to play with us rather than against us, if that makes any sense. However, I think we’ll probably end up with a draw because without Xavi, we’ll be a little lost in midfield. Official prediction: 1-1.

As always, here’s a list of Where to Watch. Remember, 1pm EST on GolTV here in the US.

Here’s the official starting lineup: Victor Valdés, Alves, Piqué, Márquez, Victor Sánchez, Iniesta, Touré, Keita, Hleb, Eto’o, Henry.

Whoa.

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*If you discount the times I was wrong.