Spain

Atletico Madrid gave themselves an unassailable four-goal advantage heading back to Madrid for the second leg of their Copa del Rey Round of 16 encounter with third division side Lleida Esportiu on Wednesday. Diego Godin and Fernando Torres opened the scoring in the first half, and then Lleida had to contend with second half substitute appearances from both Diego Costa and Antoine Griezmann, both furthering Los Colchoneros’ advantage.

In an interview with Russian news source Blic, Barcelona and Argentina demigod Lionel Messi spoke on how he’d like to improve his penalty taking in 2018 and his future prospects as a manager. 

It’s an old trope of film that always gets the job done effectively and, more importantly, concisely: the training montage. Films like the Rocky franchise, The Karate Kid, X-Men: First Class, The Fighter, Cool Runnings, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, The Hunger Games and you get the point have all utilized the uplifting sequence to quickly portray a long passage of time devoted to painstaking preparation.

Will Philippe Coutinho transfer to FC Barcelona? According to Google, that’s all anyone wants to know in 2018. We’re not here to give you a definitive answer, but to break it on down like the 2 Live Crew utilizing a system developed by The Walking Dead’s Eugene Porter. Here’s Philippe Coutinho’s rumored transfer from Liverpool to Barcelona broken into the categories of “What We Know,” “What We Know We Don’t Know” and “Things We Are Unaware Of. Wholly.”

This Pique-Neymar interview will bring tears to the eyes of many Barca nostalgics who still cannot understand the Brazilian star’s decision to leave Barcelona for PSG.

Neymar and Gerard Pique when they were teammates. Photo: @diarioas | Twitter

When FC Barcelona signed 12-year-old prospect Cristobal Munoz from a youth side affiliated with Malaga last March, the deal was heralded by Barcelona-based daily Sport as the capture of “the hottest young prospect in Spanish football.”

Dani Carvajal's fantastic reflexes prove he is a better goalkeeper than Liverpool’s Simon Mignolet, and Twitter knows it. He gave proof in the latest edition of El Clásico as he epically saved a header by Barça’s Paulinho. 

The only problem is, Carvajal is not a goalkeeper. So the referee blew the whistle, sentenced a penalty kick and sent Carvajal off via a direct red card.

When the starting lineups for Saturday’s El Clasico were announced, there was really only one surprise in the 22 players named for battle: Zinedine Zidane’s decision to drop Isco to the bench in favor of Mateo Kovacic. For many, Isco has been Real’s best player over the past year — a footballer of sublime skill, technique and playmaking ability — while Kovacic’s inclusion meant one thing only: Lionel Messi limitation.