Spanish Clubs

Even by Lionel Messi’s ridiculous standards, the Barcelona captain’s 90 minutes against Valladolid at the Camp Nou on Tuesday constitute something outrageous. After the two clubs exchanged heavily deflected efforts in the opening 15 minutes, Messi sprang into action with a beautiful assist, stunning free kick (and two brutal nutmegs) to put Barcelona up 3-1 at halftime. In the second half, he scored another goal and added another assist to lift Barça to the top of the LaLiga table.

Former Atlético Madrid youth/Arsenal flop Lucas Pérez scored the greatest goal of his career (although he did hit a nice bicycle kick earlier this season), earning Alavés a 1-1 draw with Atlético in Basque Country on Tuesday.

Granada is top of the LaLiga table. No, not the country. Granada CF, the football team from Granada, Spain. The same Granada that appointed Tony Adams in 2017 and was relegated.

Some big news coming out of UEFA Youth League Group F on Wednesday — perhaps the biggest UEFA Youth League Group F news we’ve ever presented on the hallowed pages of The18: In the group’s early match, 18-year-old American winger Konrad de la Fuente scored two great goals as Barcelona thumped Slavia Prague 4-0. Later in the day, Inter Milan responded to Borussia Dortmund’s early goal with four unanswered, but that Dortmund opener was scored by Youssoufa Moukoko.

Barcelona needed everything it could muster to hold on to a narrow 2-1 win over Slavia Prague on Wednesday in the Czech capital, surviving a late flurry from the hosts.

The three points would have been much easier to come by had it not been for a once-in-a-lifetime miss from Barcelona’s No. 10.

Barcelona had to leave for Eibar a day early due to massive political protests around the city, but the Blaugrana got out of town with an easy three points on Saturday.

MSG all found the back of the net in the same game for the first time for Barcelona, which cruised to a 3-0 victory over Eibar, momentarily leapfrogging Real Madrid into first-place. Los Blancos can surge back into first place in LaLiga with a win over Mallorca later Saturday.

El Clásico will not go on as scheduled next week, LaLiga made this much clear. But why was El Clásico postponed and when will the match be made up? Here’s a quick explainer of everything going on in Spain right now.

The first El Clásico of the season — the biggest club match in the world — was slated for Saturday, Oct. 26 at Barcelona’s Camp Nou. Now it appears the match will be rescheduled for either Dec. 4 or Dec. 18 (both Wednesdays).

Why Was El Clásico Postponed

But why was El Clásico postponed in the first place?