December 19, (THEWILL) – Barcelona won their first game of the month on Saturday, a 3-2 victory over Elche that was made far tougher than it needed to be due to a defensive blackout in the second half.
On his first start at Camp Nou, Ferran Jutgla broke the deadlock, beating two white shirts to head in Ousmane Dembele’s 16th-minute corner with Barcelona’s first shot of the game.
Three minutes later, Gavi doubled the lead with a fantastic individual goal. Starting with an electrifying Cruyff-turn away from Omar Mascarell near halfway, the 17-year-old shimmied Enzo Roco to his knees before sprinting into the penalty area and finishing the move clinically with his maiden La Liga goal.
Barcelona dominated possession and territory in the first half, limiting Elche to just one shot, though the visitors caused more issues for the hosts’ vulnerable backline than that figure lends credence to.
As Xavi Hernandez’s team glided through the quarter-hour each side of the interval with a rising confidence that outweighed their two-goal lead, the likes of Frenkie de Jong and Gavi had chances to extend Barcelona’s lead.
Elche emphasised the vulnerability of the lead with a pair of goals separated by seconds just after the hour mark. Elche scored their first goal against Barcelona since 1978 as replacement Tete Morente flicked the ball across the pitch into the gap vacated by Barcelona’s left back Jordi Alba.
In the 63rd minute, Morente found Pere Milla lurking in a stunning amount of space on the opposite side of Barcelona’s jumbled defence to level the scores and threaten the Catalans with more dropped points.
As had been the case throughout the match, Barcelona’s primarily youthful contingent provided a constant attacking threat. And, it turned out to be the difference in the end.
After some typical complex connection play from Dembele and Gavi again, 19-year-old Nico Gonzalez compensated for Xavi’s defensive difficulties, blasting home the winning goal in the 85th minute.
Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
