#2 Luis Enrique drops Iniesta and Barcelona can’t keep a clean sheet yet again
Luis Enrique named a starting lineup without regular Andres Iniesta with an eye probably on the big games to come in recent weeks and as a result found the midfield battle difficult to win in the game. Rakitic, Andre Gomes and Sergio Busquets were overshadowed by Illaramendi and Xabi Prieto in the middle.
Illarramendi, the former Real Madrid man, had a very good game pulling the strings from midfield and only when Iniesta was brought on in the 69th minute did the tide turn towards Barcelona. Without Iniesta, Barcelona couldn’t keep more of the ball as they would have liked and only created good chances once he came on.
Barcelona’s defending this season has been rather questionable and has drawn considerable criticism. The Blaugrana have found it difficult to shut out their opposition in games. The Catalan club has managed just one clean sheet (against Sevilla) in their last eight games. They conceded two against Malaga in their last La Liga game and three against Juventus in the Champions League.
In this game, they couldn’t shut out La Real as well. Some abject defending from Barcelona led to a Samuel Umtiti own goal which gave Sociedad a glimmer of hope in the game. The defending before the goal was poor by Barcelona’s high standards. Luis Enrique must sort out his defensive woes as the club head into two crunch games against Juventus and Real Madrid in the coming week.
