La Liga returned to action this week with changes galore visible and accompanied by a week of demonstrations in both Barcelona and Madrid with large groups showing solidarity, in support of racial equality in the USA, following the Ray Floyd tragedy. Covid-19 still seemed to linger in the air as masked players, coaches, trainers, ball boys, cameramen, and others populated the otherwise empty arenas.
With matches beginning with a minute of silence to remember the many who perished from Covid-19 in Spain, and later on interrupted by recorded clapping in recognition of the health care workers of the nation, there was no escaping the new normal. Outside some stadiums, marches in solidarity with those suffering racial injustice were common across the country.
Teams played in empty stadiums, all participants not on the pitch wore masks, and many gloves, players took water breaks in relatively moderate heat, teams substituted five players apiece (such as in the Real Madrid-Eibar match), and though some teams benefited by having injured players now ready for action after an extended break, more of them felt the rust in the not-quite-match-fit legs of their charges.
Barcelona opened the defense of their table lead with an easy, if fortunate, 4-0 away win over Mallorca with Lionel Messi extending his top scorer’s lead with a pretty stoppage time ricocheted goal. The match was closer than the score as the home team muffed chance after chance and seemed in the game even at half-time when they were down 0-2. In a match where Mallorca played Barca even in stretches, despite the visitor’s larger share of possession and goal-scoring chances, it was the visitors who saw early and late good luck seal the bloated scoreline. No solidarity was shown there.
On Thursday, as La Liga resumed play, Sevilla defeated visiting Real Betis 2-0. On Friday, Granada played poor hosts beating visiting Getafe 2-1. On Saturday, Espanyol won 2-0 at home to Alaves, while Villarreal took three away points from Celta Vigo and Espanyol won 2-0 at home over Alaves.
Sunday, Athletic Bilbao drew 1-1 at home against Atletico Madrid while Real Madrid, playing in their practice stadium, the Estadio Alfredo di Stefano, defeated visiting Eibar 3-1 with three pretty goals and one ugly concession. Osasuna and Real Sociedad drew 1-1.
At the weekend’s conclusion, Barcelona was top of the table at 61 points followed by Real Madrid at 59, then followed Sevilla at 50. The top scorers were Barcelona’s Messi with 20, followed by Real Madrid’s Karim Benzema at 14, and five other players at 11 goals each.
The rest of European Football
Meanwhile, as the rest of Europe also showed its solidarity with the USA tragedy, at Juventus, Cristiano Ronaldo’s first penalty miss of the season did not affect the outcome of their 0-0 home tie as their 1-1 away draw saw them reach the final of the Coppa Italia on the away rule. Serie A, playing in a country ravaged by Covid-19, resumes June 20th.
Bayern Munich, on a 13-match win streak and seven points ahead in the Bundesliga, is everyone’s favorite to clinch this year’s title.
The Premier League will begin to play on June 17th. But France’s Ligue 1 is still uncertain when they will resume play.
But, with so much societal upheaval football has not been unaffected off the pitch as well. In some pseudo-news, every team with a budget will be looking to shake up the makeup of their squads ahead of a busy summer of 2021 which will include a Euro, a Copa America, an Africa Cup of Nations, and a CONCACAF Gold Cup the same year most hope soccer will return to something closer to normalcy.
Rumors abound about transfers and trades and retirements with PSG’s Thiago Silva and Edinson Cavani rumored to be planning summer moves as well as Gareth Bale looking to complete his Madrid contract before moving on, perhaps to the MLS.
Timo Werner, Paul Pogba, Jadon Sancho and Kalidou Koulibaly are among the known quantities most likely to seek greener pastures and there are quite a few youngsters who could be making their moves to top clubs too.
With the World Cup in 2022 to be played in late November to mid-December, it will be interesting to see how clubs handle years with such lingering disruptions as Covid-19 will doubtless continue to produce together with years with so much at stake, back-to-back.
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