Atletico Madrid vs Barcelona Preview: Team News & Prediction
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We have a marquee event taking place at the Metropolitano as Atletico Madrid take on defending champions and league leaders Barcelona in the capital city.
Kick-off date/time:
How to watch on TV: UK – Premier Sports / US – ESPN have the exclusive rights to La Liga games in the USA, so any game may be televised on one of their affiliated channels
How to watch online: UK – Premier Player & Disney+ / US – ESPN+
Atletico Madrid preview: Entertaining Atleti
Diego Simeone and his Atletico Madrid play quite entertaining football nowadays with Los Rojiblancos looking ahead to a month that consists of a UEFA Champions League quarter-final against Barcelona, as well as a Copa del Rey final against Real Sociedad.
Atleti headed into the March international break on the back of a 3-2 loss to capital city rivals Real Madrid a couple of weeks ago, a few days after completing a 7-5 aggregate defeat of Tottenham Hotspur in Europe.
Barcelona preview: Brilliant Barca
Barcelona come into this one on the back of a slender 1-0 defeat of Rayo Vallecano a couple of weeks ago to stay at the top-of-the-table, just ahead of Real Madrid, with a first-half Ronald Araujo winner.
Hansi Flick's relentless and impressive Blaugrana are now unbeaten in their last eight matches across all competitions, sitting four points clear of Los Blancos ahead of this weekend's round of fixtures and the run-in.
Atletico Madrid team news: Couple of suspensions
Atletico Madrid are dealing with a couple of suspension issues for this one as the versatile Marcos Llorente is sidelined alongside United States international midfielder Johnny Cardoso.
Predicted XI (4-4-2): Musso; Nahuel Molina, Le Normand, Hancko, Ruggeri; Giuliano Simeone, Koke, Alex Baena, Lookman; Griezmann, Julian Alvarez
Unavailable: Marcos Llorente (Suspended), Pablo Barrios (Injured), Johnny (Suspended)
Questionable: Oblak (Injured), Marc Pubill (Injured), Rodri Mendoza (Injured)
Barcelona team news: Raphinha out
Key man Raphinha has suffered a hamstring injury for Brazil on international duty and he is now sidelined alongside Frenkie de Jong, with Jules Kounde a doubt.
Predicted XI (4-2-3-1): Joan Garcia; Ronald Araujo, Pau Cubarsi, Gerard Martin, Cancelo; Pedri, Marc Bernal; Lamine Yamal, Fermin Lopez, Rashford; Lewandowski
Unavailable: Christensen (Injured), De Jong (Injured), Raphinha (Injured)
Questionable: Kounde (Injured), Alex Balde (Injured)
Atletico Madrid vs Barcelona prediction
These two sides will face off against each other on five occasions in little over a month after Atletico pulled off a 4-3 aggregate win over Barca in the semi-finals of the Copa del Rey. It is worth backing yet another entertaining encounter here with a high-scoring clash to be expected for this one on Saturday evening.
Atletico Madrid vs Barcelona tip: Over 2.5 goals
