Barcelona vs Real Madrid: Spanish Super Cup, 5 Talking Points

4.No Neymar, No Party

How much will M & S miss the N?

You can laugh all you want at Neymar not having to go play in the tiny village of Guingamp while his former team hosted Real Madrid, but the Brazilian showed on the Brittany coast just what Barca had let go off - with a sumptuous assist and a goal of his own on debut.

Meanwhile back at the "home of football" Barcelona struggled with Lionel Messi having one of his rare off days (don't mistake me, the Argentine was still the best Barca player on the pitch and his off days are most people's best - but you can' t afford to bring anything less than your best against this Real Madrid side, even if you are Leo Messi).

What Neymar used to provide is irreplaceable as poor Gerard Delofeu found out soon enough - and for all his faults, the lad is a player and a half and is probably the only player on the planet who can confidently ask Messi to take a backseat if things aren't going for him. He used to take pressure off the Argentine, and draw defenders to him like a magnet would iron shavings while providing a completely different type of threat to the opposition defence.

Barcelona have been talking to Ousmane Dembele, Philippe Coutinho and even Ivan Perisic reportedly - and they need to sign one of those players at least right away - but even that may not be enough to correct the Neymar-shaped hole in their much-vaunted attack.

They wouldn't have had this issue if they'd not been such muppets in the past few transfer windows:

Barca wouldnt be scrambling for Neymar replacement if they had paid the €3.5m to sign Asensio in summer 2014. Used money for Douglas instead

— Dermot Corrigan (@dermotmcorrigan) August 13, 2017