Barcelona vs Las Palmas

Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys sets the stage for a ‘David vs Goliath’ La Liga showdown between Barcelona and Las Palmas. 

Robert Lewandowski made UEFA Champions League history during midweek, with his match-winning brace in Barcelona’s 3-0 home thumping of Brest making him only the third player in Europe’s most prestigious club competition to hit a 100-goal milestone. It was a perfect response to last weekend’s gut-wrenching 2-2 draw at Celta Vigo, which saw Barca’s lead at La Liga’s summit shrink to four points. With second-placed Real Madrid having a game in hand, Hansi Flick’s charges cannot afford a slip-up at home against a Las Palmas side they’ve defeated in nine of their 12 top-flight H2Hs in the 21st century (D3). Furthermore, ‘Los Blaugranas’ haven’t lost a home encounter against this opposition since 1971 (W18, D2), suggesting a ninth consecutive victory at their temporary home venue of Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys is a virtual certainty. 

In the meantime, visiting Las Palmas must punch above their weight to upset the apple cart in Catalonia, bidding to contend with Barcelona’s intimidating scoring ratio of 3.75 goals per home match this season. The visitors have bounced back from a disastrous nine-game winless La Liga start (D3, L6), racking up three wins across their last five league outings (L2) to climb out of the bottom three. However, a 3-2 defeat to 10-man Mallorca in the previous round kept them only two points clear of 18th-placed Valencia. Las Palmas’ ‘all or nothing’ approach has seen them lose five of their seven top-flight games on the road this term but win the other two. However, it’s worth noting that both those victories came against bottom-half opposition.