Eibar 0-3 Barcelona: 3 Talking Points

Barcelona put up a dominating display in a convincing 3-0 victory over Eibar at the Ipurua Municipal Stadium, with goals from Antoine Griezmann, Lionel Messi and Luis Suarez giving the Catalans all three points.

In what was an ultimately comfortable win, Eibar, however, gave Barcelona cause for concern in the first half and carved out several notable chances for themselves only to be let down by poor finishing and decision making in the final third.

A tactical change by Ernesto Valverde saw him bring on Nelson Semedo for Sergi Roberto at the interval and this helped strengthen Barcelona's resolve at the back, with the game pretty much straightforward from then on.

The win temporarily moves Barcelona one point clear at the top of the table pending the outcome of the clash between Real Madrid and RCD Mallorca.

Here, we shall be highlighting three talking points from the matchday 9 LaLiga fixture.

#3 After a rocky start, Ernesto Valverde slowly calming the storm

Valverde has masterminded five consecutive victories for Barcelona

Following Barcelona's shock elimination against Liverpool in the semifinal of the Champions League last season, there were numerous calls for the head of Valverde and rightly so, as this defeat came on the back of another debilitating loss to AS Roma the previous season.

However, the Barcelona board elected to stick with him and the seeming folly of their decision threatened to be exposed following Barcelona's poor start to the campaign.

They began their league defence with a 1-0 loss to Athletic Bilbao and picked up just seven points from their opening five matches, while also failing to defeat newly promoted teams in consecutive matches.

However, since that 2-0 defeat to Granada at the Nuevo Estadio de Los Cármenes, the Blaugrana have seen a massive upturn in their fortunes and have thrust themselves right back into the title race.

The 3-0 victory over Eibar means that Barcelona have won five consecutive matches in all competitions and there were some pretty impressive victories in that run, including wins over Inter Milan, Sevilla, and Villareal.

There is no doubt that this upturn in fortune had a lot with the return to fitness of Lionel Messi, but Ernesto Valverde would not care much, as his side have survived the stormy waters to put paid to premature talks of crisis at the Camp Nou.

#2 Barcelona's front three come good

Griezmann and Suarez got on the scoresheet

After one of the most protracted transfers in recent memory, Antoine Griezmann finally joined Barcelona over the summer for the sum of €120m.

The 28-year-old had proven his mettle with Atletico Madrid and it was expected that he would complement Lionel Messi and Luis Suarez in attack, but unfortunate injuries to the two Barcelona legends meant that fans of the Blaugrana had to wait to see the three men in action.

Against Villareal on matchday 6, the trio started a game together for the first time, but Messi's substitution at half-time ended the parade before it truly began.

With all three men fit and raring to go, Ernesto Valverde deployed his three attacking weapons against Eibar from the get-go and it took less than 15 minutes for one of them to get on the scoresheet, as Antoine Griezmann neatly put the home side ahead in the 13th minute.

After surviving an onslaught of Eibar pressure for the rest of the first half, Barcelona entered full gear in the second and Lionel Messi got his second goal of the campaign exquisitely.

Frenkie de Jong initiated the attack and found Luis Suarez who in turn played in Antoine Griezmann and the Frenchman found Lionel Messi with an exquisite flick with his backheel.

With Lionel Messi faced one-on-one with any goalkeeper in such a scenario, there is usually only one outcome and nobody would have been genuinely surprised when the ball ended in the back of the net to send Barcelona 2-0 up in the 58th minute.

Just eight minutes later, Messi tuned provider as he latched onto a pristine through ball by Griezmann and unselfishly squared for his Uruguayan teammate to put the result beyond the reach of Eibar.

This means that all three men got their names on the scoresheet and what would have been most pleasing to Valverde is the excellent link-up play and understanding exhibited by the trio.

Prior to his arrival, there were fears expressed over whether Antoine Griezmann could adapt to the gameplay of Luis Suarez and Lionel Messi, but while there were moments where he appeared out of sync with his fellow forwards particularly in the first half, on the overall balance of play, he worked excellently in tandem with the two.

#1 Frenkie de Jong puts in another spectacular display

Frenkie de Jong was one of the stars of the show in Ajax's fairytale campaign last season and this prompted a €75m transfer to Barcelona in January.

He continued his upward projection at Barcelona and was one of their standout players during pre-season, but had a somewhat mixed start to his official Barcelona career.

The Dutch international has however established himself as a key member of Valverde's lineup and was deployed on the right of a midfield three alongside Sergio Busquets and Arthur Melo against Eibar.

From this position, the 22-year-old was nothing short of spectacular and was one of the major contributors to Barcelona's win in Saturday's early kickoff in the Basque country.

Frenkie de Jong stepped up the ante in the second half and was the instigator of many Barcelona attacks, with two in quick succession at the restart but neither chance was converted.

In total, he completed 90% of his attempted passes, while nobody on the field attempted more than his two key passes.

Having started the attack that led to Barcelona's second goal, Frenkie de Jong was substituted for Ivan Rakitic in the 79th minute and despite the huge outlay expended to get him, Frenkie de Jong is proving to be worth every penny.