Barcelona will remain second in La Liga but their eight-game winning streak has come to an end thanks to a 1-0 home defeat by Cádiz on Monday night. Barça weren’t at their best that night, conceding an early goal in the second and finding no way to break through the visitors’ stubborn defense who staged a major upset at the Camp Nou to get out of the relegation zone.
FIRST HALF
The first 45 minutes weren’t the best we’ve seen, but Barça’s game still had its upsides: the Blaugrana came out with good pace and rhythm in the attacking third, finding gaps within the Cadiz defense with good movements in and around the Box and they were really dangerous when Ousmane Dembélé was involved.
The Frenchman was by far the best player on the pitch in the opening period, dominating every Cadiz defender in his path with his speed and dribbling and throwing dangerous crosses that either went just wide or were cleared at the last second by an opposing defender became. He also had a powerful shot that was saved well by Ledesma, which was Barça’s best chance of the half but the Blaugrana failed to find the back of the net.
Cádiz defended very deep and attacked very little for most of the half, but had a huge chance himself: after a long ball forward, Rubén Sobrino gave Lucas Pérez a tap-in from eight yards, but the Cádiz striker somehow missed the target and went lost his team’s greatest opportunity in that time.
Barça played well enough at half-time to take a deserved lead, but Cádiz fired a warning shot of their own and we kind of went into the second half goalless.
SECOND HALF
Barça started the second half by conceding: after a cross from the left with both Eric García and Clément Lenglet watching the ball, Rubén Sobrino forced an amazing double save from Marc-André ter Stegen, but Lucas Pérez was the first to make the A rebound saved gave Cádiz the lead and Barça had 40 minutes to stage a comeback.
The Blaugrana certainly tried as hard as they could to go forward in search of the winning goals and they came very close several times but either missed the final pass or saw goalkeeper Ledesma make excellent saves. Cádiz kept finding a way to maintain their slim lead and had some great chances to double their lead and end the game, Álex Fernández missing the biggest of them with a wide-open miss, much like Pérez in the first halftime .
Xavi Hernández sent Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Adama Traoré and Luuk De Jong off the bench to make an impact and De Jong looked very dangerous on crosses as he often does but it just didn’t seem like Barça’s night , when we moved into the final 10 minutes.
Barça kept pushing and creating really good chances, but Ledesma had an amazing night in goal, making great save after great save to keep the goal. The final whistle came and Barça have now lost twice in a row at home to teams they should have beaten and that’s now four poor performances in a row in the last 10 days. The mood isn’t great at the moment and Real Sociedad are away on Thursday. It’s time to act before things get dicey in the league.
Barcelona: Ter Stegen; Dest (Mingueza 90+4′), Eric, Lenglet (Adama 77′), Alba; F. De Jong (L. De Jong 77′), Busquets, Gavi; Dembele, Memphis (Aubameyang 61st), Ferran
Goals: None
Cadiz: ledesma; Parra (Akapo 76′), Hernández, Fali, Espino; Jonsson (Chust 76′), Mari (Emeterio 64′); Sobrino (Arzamendia 82′), Hernandez, Sanchez (Alejo 64′); Perez
Goal: Perez (48′)