Barcelona’s decade of dominance continued last weekend as they wrapped up this season’s La Liga title, their seventh in 10 years and 25th in their history.
Even in the three years that they didn’t win the title, they weren’t far off, as they took the title race into the final weekend before losing out to Atletico Madrid in 2014 and Real Madrid last year.
There was little danger of this year’s title going into a final weekend decider though, as Barcelona are still unbeaten in the league and could become the first team to go through the season unbeaten in Spain.
Astonishingly, this season’s domestic success, they won the Copa del Rey too, hasn’t secured manager Ernesto Valverde’s future as there’s still dismay as to how the club were dumped out of the Champions League by Roma in the quarter finals.
There’s still four games of this season’s La Liga to play though, including this weekend’s Clasico against Real Madrid. Here are five key games that saw Valverde’s team run away with the title.
1-1 vs. Valencia, 26th November 2017
Valencia looked rejuvenated at the beginning of the season and by the time they came to play Barcelona in November, they were still unbeaten. Under new manager Marcelino, the fans in the Mestalla were right behind the home team, after years of suffering under previous regimes.
There was plenty of controversy in this one, as Lionel Messi scored a first half goal, which was ruled out, despite clearly crossing the line. Frustration grew among the Catalan players, which only increased when Valencia striker Rodrigo found the back of the net. However, they responded with less than 10 minutes to go, as Jordi Alba latched onto Lionel Messi’s pass to equalise.
The importance of this goal cannot be underestimated. Had Valencia held on to win the game, they’d have moved to within one point of Barcelona, which would have increased confidence in the camp and belief that they could go toe-to-toe with the Spanish giants in La Liga. A defeat here for Barcelona would have been a hammer blow to confidence and could have had ramifications in the following games.
3-0 vs. Real Madrid, 23rd December 2017
The Clasicos are always huge games and with Real Madrid struggling, this was a prime opportunity for Barcelona to end their rivals’ title challenge. The first half was a quiet affair as far as this fixture goes, but Barcelona’s record in the second half of games this season has been incredible.
The second half of this game saw Barcelona put Real to the sword, with goals from Luis Suarez and Messi putting them out of sight, with no response from Madrid. Aleix Vidal scored the third in stoppage time. This victory saw them move 9 points clear of second-place Atletico, while Real Madrid were staring down the barrel of a 14-point deficit to their rivals, as good as out of the race.
4-2 vs. Real Sociedad, 14th January 2018
Barcelona fans would have been thinking that they were under a curse when they played at the Anoeta. Their team hadn’t won a game there since 2007, when Frank Rijkaard was manager, and they quickly went two goals down under heavy rain.
However, one quality that’s possessed by all champion teams is resilience, with Paulinho’s 39th minute goal the start of what was an inspirational comeback for the Blaugranas. Luis Suarez scored a second half brace, before Lionel Messi’s free kick ensured that there were no demons lurking in the Basque Country in 2018. Once again, they came from behind to keep their unbeaten streak alive.
6-1 vs. Girona, 24th February 2018
Narrow wins are the sign of a champion side. However, being the league champions isn’t much fun if you’re not willing to hammer some of your opponents over the course of the season. Espanyol, Eibar and Real Betis have all felt the wrath of the Catalan side this campaign, but none of them came close to suffering what Girona went through in February.
Portu fired them ahead after just three minutes and that was enough to fire Barcelona into action. Led by the talismanic Messi, the Blaugranas put in an incredible performance for the next 42 minutes, which saw them score four times, two for Messi and two for Suarez. They eased off the gas in the second half, but Suarez completed his hat-trick and Coutinho scored a belter from long range.
1-0 vs. Atletico Madrid, 4th March 2018
Barcelona came dangerously close to not only losing their unbeaten run in March, but also running the risk of having a title race take place. After three draws in five games, newspapers started printing headlines like “Hay Liga!”, meaning “There’s a league!”
Second place Atletico Madrid came to the Camp Nou, having closed the gap between the two sides to five points and knowing that victory would further cut the gap to just two points. As has been the case for most of the last decade, Lionel Messi had other ideas and struck home a free kick in the first half, his third in as many games, which proved at the end to be the difference between the two sides. Barcelona went eight points clear and all but wrapped up the La Liga title in the process.
