Agency Report<\/u><\/i><\/p>\n
Barcelona stretched their La Liga lead over Real Madrid to a substantial eight points with a comfortable 3-0 win over Sevilla on Sunday.<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n The Catalans, aiming to win their first Spanish title since 2019, punished second-placed Madrid for their 1-0 defeat by Real Mallorca earlier on, opening up a wide gap ahead of their rivals.<\/span><\/p>\n After a tight first half Jordi Alba broke the deadlock before the hour mark, with further goals from Gavi and Raphinha helping wrap up the win.<\/span><\/p>\n Barcelona coach Xavi Hernandez had criticised his team in recent weeks for not killing off games after taking the lead but they did not let him down at Camp Nou.<\/span><\/p>\n The victory was their 10th in their last 11 league games, while Barca are now unbeaten in 15 matches across all competitions.<\/span><\/p>\n Barcelona have conceded just seven goals in La Liga this season, with this their 15th clean sheet.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI think we are having a very good season, we\u2019re playing well, letting opponents have few chances,\u201d Alba told DAZN.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re happy, eight points clear but there\u2019s a long way to go. It\u2019s a good distance (if we) keep going like this.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Barcelona\u2019s gameplan was initially set back when captain Sergio Busquets was forced off with an ankle injury after just four minutes, replaced by Franck Kessie.<\/span><\/p>\n Jorge Sampaoli\u2019s Sevilla, 16th after a dismal start to the season, sat deep with five defenders and looked to frustrate the Catalans at every turn.<\/span><\/p>\n Moroccan goalkeeper Yassine Bounou denied La Liga\u2019s top scorer Robert Lewandowski at his near post early on, while Ronald Araujo headed narrowly off-target from a corner.<\/span><\/p>\n Bounou flung himself full stretch to foil a vicious Lewandowski drive from distance as Barcelona struggled to forge clear chances.<\/span><\/p>\n Sevilla were a little fortunate to survive the first half with 10 men when Ivan Rakitic\u2019s late lunge on Araujo was only punished with a yellow card.<\/span><\/p>\n Lewandowski nodded wide and Raphinha headed at Bounou at the start of the second half as the team came out with renewed vigour, keen to capitalise on Real Madrid\u2019s defeat.<\/span><\/p>\n Alba pounced with a tidy finish after a superb assist from Kessie, who turned well and dinked the ball into the Spaniard\u2019s path.<\/span><\/p>\n After Sevilla shifted to a more attacking formation Raphinha teed up Gavi for the second with a raking low pass that left the youngster with a tap-in at the back post in the 70th minute.<\/span><\/p>\n Raphinha provided the cutting edge on a slick 17-pass team move for the goal, in an impressive outing in place of the injured Ousmane Dembele.<\/span><\/p>\n Lewandowski dragged a free-kick narrowly wide as Barcelona looked to kill the game off, with the Andalusians flagging.<\/span><\/p>\n Alba crossed for former Leeds United winger Raphinha to finish from point-blank range for the third goal, wrapping up a satisfying day for the hosts.<\/span><\/p>\n Sevilla\u2019s former Barcelona midfielder Rakitic was serenaded by home fans but left dismayed at his team\u2019s lack of intent.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI think that to be able to take something from Camp Nou, you have to be a lot braver,\u201d the Croatian told DAZN.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cYou have to try, even if it\u2019s hard. Waiting so long, in the end a team like Barca will find you out. We have to get points, now.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n AFP<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Barcelona stretched their La Liga lead over Real Madrid to a substantial eight points with a comfortable 3-0 win over Sevilla on Sunday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11878,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[715,586,1444],"class_list":["post-11877","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-barca","tag-la-liga","tag-sevilla"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11877"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11877"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11877\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11879,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11877\/revisions\/11879"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11878"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11877"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11877"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11877"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}