Celta Vigo will welcome Barcelona to the Estadio de Balaidos this weekend as they lock horns in their round of 32 La Liga games for the season.
The hosts who go into this game of n the back of an impressive 1-0 win over Sociedad will be confident of pulling up a positive result against a Barca side who have been knocked off the table by Real Madrid.
Meanwhile, the visitors head into this tie on the back of a 1-nil win against Athletico Bilbao despite dropping two points recently, Lionel Messi and co. still remain level on points with Real Madrid on 68 points, with Real enjoying a superior head to head. A win here will do their title defense a lot of good as any further dropped points could be detrimental to their season’s goal.
Team News
Fran Beltran is an injury doubt for this game after sustaining a muscle injury while David Junca is still out with a shoulder injury. Sergio Alvarez remains the only long-term injury absentee for Oscar Garcia’s side.
Sergio Busquets will serve his one-game disciplinary ban while Ousmane Dembele and Frankie de Jong remain long term injury doubts for Barca.
Head to head
Barcelona enjoy a superior head to head record in this tie, winning two of their last five La Ligas games. Celta meanwhile have won once in the last five with the other two games ending in 2:2 draws.
Team Form
Celta Vigo last five games in all competitions: WWDLD
Barca last five games in all competitions: WDWWW
Betting Preview
Celta Vigo head into this game with just two losses from their last ten league games (w4, D4). Since the restart, Garcia’s boys have won twice in four games with an impressive six-nil win against Alaves the pick of the bunch.
Their most recent win against Sociedad means that the hosts have won two of their last league games without conceding a goal. In fact, in Celta’s last seven La Liga games, they have kept six clean sheets with six of those games ending with under 1.5 goals.
In the league this season, the visitors have scored one of the lowest number of goals, with their average of 0.94 goals per game, one of the lowest in the league. The hosts have failed to score in thirteen of the 31 league games this season, with six of those scoreless games coming at home.
However defensively, they have done reasonably well, conceding just over 1.0 goals per game and keeping eleven clean sheets.
Barca meanwhile head into the game with a fifth consecutive clean sheet in the bag. Their last 1-nil win over Bilbao means that they have not conceded a goal since after the league’s restart.
They remain the league top scorers though and have netted an average of 2.26 goals per game in the league this season. Of the 70 goals they have scored in the league, exactly half have come in the first half.
They have conceded 31 times in the league—thirteen in the first half, eighteen in the second half. They have failed to score in three of their last five away games in the league.
They have failed to win in their last four visits to this stadium.
Meanwhile, Barca have conceded the opener in 60% of their away games in the league this season although they did win two of those fixtures (D3, L4).
Suggested Bets
Under 3.5 Goals @ 2/5
Celta to win the first half/Barca to win the second half @ 25/1
Lionel Messi anytime scorer @ 10/11
