There was one clear winner from the Madrid derby: Barcelona. The Real Madrid vs. Atletico Madrid match ended in a 0-0 draw, leaving both clubs 10 points behind Barcelona, which itself won 3-0 over Leganes in Madrid on Saturday.
Heroic defending trumped erratic but skillful attacks at the wonderful Wanda, with neither side able to get the ball across the line in a match both Madrid clubs desperately needed to win. Barcelona’s victory pushed the Catalan club to 34 points in La Liga while Real and Atletico are stuck on 24. Valencia, which has a game in hand (plus a match against Barcelona next weekend), is seven points back of Barcelona.
This is how many points Barcelona leads the Madrid clubs by. Photo: @BarcaUniversal | Twitter
The heated Madrid derby featured plenty of attacking action and even more defensive reaction. Every time either side came close to scoring, the defense stepped up with a big stop. There was one notable exception early on, when two horrible Real Madrid passes set up Angel Correa with only the keeper to beat, but the Argentinean shot wide.
Cristiano Ronaldo and Antoine Griezmann both continued their season slumps, unable to really impact the match in a positive way. Ronaldo is still stuck on one goal in La Liga while Griezmann remained on two goals.
Both teams made gallant defensive efforts to prevent the other side from scoring in the second half. Real’s Rafael Varane made a goal-line clearance on a Kevin Gameiro chip in the 78th minute. With a couple minutes to play, Lucas Hernandez, whose brother Theo was an unused substitute for Real, made a match-saving block on Cristiano Ronaldo.
As one would expect from a derby of this caliber there was an abundance of physical play. Real in particular took plenty of punishment from Atletico.
Correa got away with crushing the ball straight into the head of a prone Karim Benzema after the whistle had blown, much to the chagrin of Real fans everywhere who thought he should have been sent off.
Sergio Ramos had to be substituted out at halftime after being bloodied by a kick to the face from Lucas Hernandez.
Real also had a couple penalty shouts but neither team really deserved to come out on top thanks to some last-ditch defending.
Elsewhere in Madrid, Luis Suarez scored a brace and Paulinho toe-poked the silliest Lionel Messi assist you’ll ever see to propel Barcelona to victory.
It wasn’t pretty, but it was more than enough to see Barcelona open up a massive lead in La Liga.
The18 Recommends For You
