The first El Clásico of this season went to Real Madrid, who defeated their fierce rival at the Santiago Bernabéu.
Los Blancos put in a fantastic performance to claim a narrow 2-1 victory. Madrid started strongly and through Kylian Mbappé nearly opened the scoring, but the goal was cancelled by VAR for offside. However, just 10 minutes later, the Frenchman benefited from a masterful assist by Kylian Mbappé to break the deadlock (22′).
Barcelona then responded with a counter-attack, where Fermin López did not fail in front of Courtois after an assist from Marcus Rashford (38′
Madrid was more dominant and with full merit regained the lead thanks to Jude Bellingham, who scored from close range after a fantastic assist by Éder Militão (43′). In fact, the Madrid side scored again through Mbappé, but it was cancelled by VAR for offside once more.
Real could easily have made it 3-1; this time Mbappé missed from the penalty spot, with Szczesny making a superb save. The 15-time European champions then had yet another goal ruled out, this time by Bellingham because of offside.
Barcelona tried to produce some chances towards the end but Real’s defensive back-line was unbreakable.
It’s worth noting that in the final minute, Pedri received his second yellow card and was sent off (90+10′).
Thus Real leave five points ahead of Barcelona in La Liga, collecting 27 points, while the Blaugrana remain in second place with 22.
