Barcelona has a slim lead with 54 wins over a total of 107 head-to-head games. Real Madrid was far more formidable the previous season. They easily won the semi-final series of the ACB League. In addition, the "Whites" performed better in the Spanish Super Cup in September (89:83).
Barcelona started the season with the new bench and the new coach overall. Chimezie Metu has positives but the Nigerian got hurt and will be back in January. Justin Anderson is seeking to come into the team from Valencia’s transfer. However, it appears that this forward has no skill at it. The Catalans suffered a major blow when Nico Laprovittola sustained a cruciate ligament injury that will see him miss the whole of the next season at Barcelona. The club began looking for his replacement urgently and they landed on Raul Neto.
The Brazilian has also features at some point for the ACB League as well as the NBA but he has never featured in the EuroLeague. Again in his home country at the age of 32 he had another career hurdle awaiting him. Now, he should be ready to play the EuroLeague, and, hopefully, against Real Madrid. It must be mentioned that the “Blaugrana” lost the two final EuroLeague games and did not even score a hundred points at least.
At home, they sensationally lost to Paris (87:They could not match the midfield penetration of Borussia for ninety two minutes in the ninety sixth minute at Signal Iduna Park and they could not respond to Bayern’s long-range bombardment over ninety three minutes in the one hundred and third at Allianz Arena.
A clear staffing shortage in Real Madrid this season is seen. They decided part with some veterans, they left them as Company Commanders, effectively replacing them with no one. Thus, the team exists, but it has issues: in the national championship, they already have two failures. They succeed even less in the EuroLeague by just finishing the top ten.
Recently, Madrid had a weak stretch of five matches, managing to beat only Virtus (98:86). In the last round, there were problems with Alba as well, which has even fewer quality players left (98:84). Furthermore, the half was drawn also. Real Madrid could only do this after the break as the match threatened to end in a very tense manner. The team is almost fully prepared for “El Clásico”. The rest of the team is averagely available for the game while Usman Garuba has injury woes.
This season, Barcelona has generally outperformed Real Madrid, with the exception of last week's crushing defeat in Munich. In Round 11, Los Blancos defeated ALBA Berlin after a stumbling defensive first half before winning by double digits. But I believe Barcelona will recover this week, and I believe Barcelona will value this game more than Real does.
Javi: Since Real and Barcelona are well-versed in one another and minor nuances frequently have a big impact, El Clásico is generally one of the most difficult games to predict in international sports. Specifically, neither side has been playing at their best right now: Barcelona has lost their last two meetings with Real Madrid, while Real is searching for its first road victory of the EuroLeague season. Youssoupha Fall and Justin Anderson, who the Azulgrana signed this past summer, will be used against Real Madrid's Walter Tavares and Facu Campazzo, respectively. The atmosphere at Palau Blaugrana will be electrifying, and it also performs at home.
However, Los Blancos haven't won a EuroLeague Clásico at Palau since 2018, and Real has a core group of players who have played together in numerous games like this. Dzanan Musa is also returning. I'm going for the unexpected because of this: Real's incredible effort against its bitter rival ends their road losing run.
