For the first time in more than six decades, Barcelona will play a competitive home game away from Camp Nou.
Cadiz are the opponents making the trek up the hill in Montjuic to Barcelona’s temporary home at the city’s Olympic Stadium. The club beat Tottenham Hotspur in a pre-season friendly at the ground which has chiefly been used for track and field events – if at all – in recent years.
Here’s the Barcelona XI Xavi Hernandez may send out against Cadiz for the first competitive fixture of a stay that is scheduled to bleed over into the 2024/25 campaign.
GK: Marc-Andre ter Stegen – Last season’s impenetrable wall had precious little to do against Getafe.
RB: Sergi Roberto – In the absence of Ronald Araujo and any natural right-backs from the transfer market, Roberto could be shoehorned into defence once again.
CB: Jules Kounde – Last season, Kounde wasn’t officially registered as a Barcelona player until the campaign began. This term, he was one of the few that didn’t emphatically disappoint in the curtain-raiser against Getafe.
CB: Andreas Christensen – Capable of playing in defence or midfield, Christensen grew up with ambitions of becoming a goalkeeper like his father, Sten, who patrolled the posts for Danish side Brondby.
LB: Alejandro Balde – La Liga president Javier Tebas claimed that Barcelona needed to cut around €200m (£171m) from their wage bill this summer but Balde still earned a pay rise over the off-season.
CM: Frenkie De Jong – No player took more touches or completed more passes across the opening weekend of La Liga but De Jong created only one half-chance against Getafe.
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CM: Oriol Romeu – More than 12 years elapsed between Romeu’s first two league appearances for Barcelona – just like the contest against Getafe last weekend, his first outing in 2011 (after sharing the bench with Xavi) ended 0-0.
CM: Pedri – For Xavi, Pedri is a nailed-on starter. “Pedri gives us a lot of tranquillity,” the coach once explained. “He makes every ball that goes through his feet better. I’m just calmer when he has the ball, it’s that simple.”
RW: Ez Abde – With Ansu Fati’s future the subject of constant speculation, Xavi turned to Abde over the team’s number 10 from the bench against Getafe. As Raphinha watches on suspended, Abde could get the nod again.
ST: Robert Lewandowski – After a haul of 23 league goals last term, Lewandowski became the first player since Ruud van Nistelrooy in 2007 to finish as La Liga’s top scorer in his debut season.
LW: Gavi – Following his first year in La Masia, Gavi asked his parents if he could move in with his teammates who lived permanently at the club’s academy. The opposite of most players having to overcome homesickness.
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