Barcelona ground out an unconvincing 3-2 home win against storm cellar club Almeria on Wednesday because of a late Sergi Roberto objective, moving them up to third in La Liga. Xavi Hernandez’s side finished 2023 with a success because of Sergi Roberto’s twofold and a first-half objective from Raphinha. Two times the twentieth set guests fixed back the Catalan monsters kindness of objectives from Leo Baptistao and Edgar Gonzalez however it was at last the host group who held out to guarantee the riches. The opening 45 minutes hurled a few decent opportunities for the two sides as Barcelona set about deliberately attempting to separate the guests.
It was almost an early set-piece that got the job done for the Catalans when commander Sergi Roberto was abandoned in the focal point of the container however ‘attendant Luis Maximiano did extraordinarily well to keep out his headed exertion.
The hosts then, at that point, had an admonition chance at the opposite end after Ronald Araujo missed a cross and Joao Cancelo frantically needed to mediate to obstruct Largie Ramazani’s work in the thirteenth moment.
Raphinha opened the scoring on 33 minutes when frail Almeria guarding, again from a corner, permitted Araujo to get a header goalwards, Maximiano made another fine stop yet couldn’t make any meaningful difference with Raphinha’s lashed bounce back.
Presently in the number one spot, Xavi’s charges took their foot off the pedal, at this point they nearly got a subsequent when Robert Lewandowski was gifted the ball in the container by a protector and just another superb Maximiano save denied him.
This drop in force did then end up being their demise as only eight minutes after the fact, Leo Baptistao stunned them with a balancer.
A cautious blunder by Araujo let Sergio Arribas slip the Brazilian striker through and his dinked finish over Inaki Pena immediately brought about the associate’s banner being raised.
At first off-side prior in the move, VAR replays showed he had got back onside when Arribas played him the ball.
Xavi rang the progressions at half-time and sent on Ferran Torres and Jules Kounde instead of Joao Felix and Andreas Christensen.
Torres had a moment influence, working the Portuguese plug with a firm strike three minutes after half-time.
Regardless of this infusion of speed, the home side actually looked drowsy.
Unfortunate set-piece shielding gave Barca the opportunity they expected to get back in front on the hour mark, Sergi Roberto meeting a corner at the close to post and hurling a header over the goalkeeper’s plunge into the furthest corner.
The subsequent objective seemed to have taken the stuffing out of the twentieth put side however a gift from Pena got them back in it, when he dropped a hurled free-kick at Edgar’s feet and the safeguard joyfully folded the ball into the unguarded net.
Barca had a brilliant opportunity to dominate the match with a little more than 10 minutes remaining, yet first Lewandowski then Ilkay Gundogan couldn’t connect with their headers when the objective was expanding before them.
Yet, it was Sergi Roberto, in his fifth appearance of the time, that gave the triumphant objective to the Spanish bosses when he burst onto Lewandowski’s hurled pass in the 83rd moment and opened past Maximiano.
After five minutes, Pena offered reparations for his previous blunder by making an extraordinary reflex save from an Iddrisu Baba header as his side staggered over the line in an upside down experience.
Afterward, Athletic Bilbao went level on focuses with fourth-place Atletico Madrid subsequent to beating Las Palmas 1-0 and close to the foot of the table, Rafael Benitez’s Celta Vigo lost 3-2 at Villarreal.
