Eibar 0-3 Barcelona: Report, Ratings & Reaction as Front Three All Fire in Vital Away Win

?Barcelona have extended their unbeaten run to 10 games across all competitions with a 3-0 win on the road at SD Eibar on Saturday.

Antoine Griezmann scored the only goal of the first half after just 15 minutes, breaking the offside trap and capitalising on Pablo de Blasis’ slip before squeezing the ball past goalkeeper Marko Dmitrovi? via the inside of the post.

Luis Suárez found the back of the net shortly after the break but was correctly denied by the offside flag, although the Uruguayan was involved soon after as Lionel Messi doubled Barça’s lead just before the hour mark.

Luis Suarez,Lionel Messi

Suárez eventually did get his name on the scoresheet with a simple finish, but it was a goal that was once again only made possible by Griezmann – the Frenchman’s through ball split Eibar’s defence for Messi to tee up his Uruguayan teammate.

Half-chances came for both sides as the game went on but neither could add to the scoreline, with Barcelona eventually running out comfortable winners after a hard-fought opening hour in the Basque Country.


SD Eibar

Player Ratings

Dmitrovic (8); de Blasis (5), Oliveira (7), Arbilla (6), Cote (7); Orellana (7), Diop (5), Alvarez (6), Leon (6); Enrich (7), Charles (6).

Substitutes: Edu Expósito (6), Inui (6), Kike (6).


FC Barcelona

Key Talking Point

Three points are three points at the end of the day, but any assumptions that Barcelona’s trip to Eibar was a walk in the park couldn’t be further from the truth.

Antoine Griezmann

Barça spent most of their afternoon at the picturesque Municipal de Ipurua on the backfoot, with strikers Charles and Sergi Enrich ensuring that they were a handful throughout, even though very little was created by Eibar’s attacking players.

The majority of the visitors’ most impressive moments came either from counter-attacks or by exploiting Eibar’s high defensive line with long balls – something which saw Griezmann break the deadlock in the first half.

Barcelona’s quality eventually shone through as they extended their unbeaten run to 10 games, but there’s still plenty of work for Ernesto Valverde’s side to do if they want to retain their league title this season.


Player Ratings

Ter Stegen (7); Roberto (6), Umtiti (6), Lenglet (8), Alba (7); de Jong (7), Busquets (7), Arthur (6); Messi (8), Suarez (7), Griezmann (9*).


Substitutes: Semedo (7), Vidal (6), Rakitic (6).


Star Man

Eyebrows were raised when Antoine Griezmann moved to Barcelona from Atletico Madrid, but the World Cup winner once again proved why he was a fantastic investment from the Blaugrana.

Griezmann’s shown his worth thanks to his defensive contributions in recent weeks, but the 28-year-old was also involved in each of Barcelona’s three goals on Saturday – getting a goal, an assists, and providing the crucial pass for Suárez’s effort.





It wasn’t a vintage team performance from Barcelona, but Griezmann stepped up exactly when his side needed him to and showed exactly why the club’s key decision makers shelled out €120m for his signature during the summer.


Looking Ahead

Barcelona break for Champions League duty where they’ll be on the road to Sparta Praha, while next week’s El Clasico has been postponed.

SD Eibar travel to Real Valladolid on October 26.


For more from Ben Carter, follow him on Twitter!

Let’

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *