Xavi wins his first trophy with Barca as Coach
Xavi Hernández has won his first major trophy as FC Barcelona coach after the team were clear winners on Sunday in the Spanish Super Cup Final.
Barcelona beat Real Madrid in SuperCopa Espana Final 2022-23. It was expected to be a thriller but ended up in a one sided match. Both teams started with their usual lineup except for one change in both the teams.
Real Madrid Started with Camavinga in the middle as Tchuameni was injured and Barcelona opted for Araujo as Right back in place of Kuande who played as Center back. This was a brilliant setup by Xavi as he wanted to shut Vinicius down in that wing side which actually was proven right. Araujo nullified the threat of Vinicius who could not do much and was totally ineffective other than winning a few fouls here and there.
Barcelona started with a high tempo and pressed very high up the pitch and Madrid could not cope-up with the pressure. The trio of Modric Camavinga and Kroos could not make proper forward passes, there were many misplaced passes in the match. Barcelona had total control of the game.
In the 33rd Minute Barcelona pressed high which resulted in a misplaced pass and Barcelona took their chance, Lewandowski passed the ball to Gavi who shot past the goalkeeper. Courtois couldn’t do anything to stop the shot. This was a massive boost for Barcelona as they started getting more tempo and more chances on the goal but couldn’t score until the 45th minute when it was Lewandowski’s turn to score the goal. This time it was Gavi who provided the assistance to him.
After Halftime it was expected that Madrid would improve their game, but this was not the case. Barcelona again started taking control of the game and got multiple chances to score.
In the 69th minute, Gavi had the ball and took a turn past Carvajal to cross inside the 6-yard box where Pedri pounced on the ball and scored. It was 3-0 to Barcelona and the game was over for Real Madrid. Madrid did make some substitutions in order to control the game, but it was all useless.
Finally, in extra time (93rd minute), Benzema got a consolation goal for Madrid but by that time it was all over. Xavi won his first trophy in charge of Barcelona since 2022.
