Real Sociedad Takes Down FC Barcelona 3:1 Saturday

Steven Petrov
The Paw Print

The “Blaugranas” gave up the 1st place in La Liga

A major disappointment for Tata Martino and all of Barcelona’s players, fans, and staff on Saturday, after falling 3 to 1 in their visit of Real Sociedad in a game of the 25th round of the Spanish Primera Division, played in front of 30,485 people at “Anoeta” stadium. The game started tough for the team from Barcelona and their midfielder Alexander Song scored an own goal in the 32nd minute. However, the “blaugranas” were able to come back quickly, after Lionel Messi equalized in the 36th minute. Real Sociedad won the game in the second half after goals from Antoine Griezmann and David Zurutuza, in the 54th and the 59th minute respectively. This was the first time since the summer of 2012 when the all time Barcelona’s rivals C.F. Real Madrid finished in front of the team from Barcelona, in La Liga’s table. Now the “Los Blancos” are 3 points ahead of FC Barcelona and Athletico Madrid, before the upcoming derby of Madrid this next weekend.
The game for Barcelona started Pedro Rodriguez, Lionel Messi and Neymar and Xavi Hernandez. Sesc Fabregas and Alexis Sanchez were left on the bench. Real Sociedad came on with a 4-2-3-1 formation led by Carlos Vela up top. The way the game went was similar to the way we usually see Barcelona play, a lot of possession, multiple sideways, short passes, and long and slowly built attacks. However, the main difference in this game was the fact that the “blaugranas” were not dangerous and were unable to create the usual large number of goal scoring opportunities in front of their opponent’s goal. The “basques” from Real Sociedad, on the other hand, were extremely compact and dangerous on the counter-attack creating multiple goal scoring opportunities, scoring three of them, hitting the post, and missing a couple. After losing the 3 points on Saturday, FC Barcelona is without a win on “Anoeta” stadium since the spring of 2007. This was also the second loss for the “blaugranas” from the “basques” of Sociedad this season.