Barcelona vs Sevilla 05/10/20

5 October 2020

Sevilla travel to Camp Nou to take on Barcelona, hoping to take advantage of a strong league start to post their first La Liga win in Catalonia since 2002.

After a commanding 4-0 home win over Villarreal in their La Liga opener, the 10-men Barcelona side eased past Celta Vigo 3-0 on the road last time out. Quick out of the blocks, Ronald Koeman’s men have scored the opening goal inside the first 15 minutes of play on both of those occasions. In turn, delivering action from the get-go, Barca opened the scoring in a league-high 16 La Liga home outings back in 2019/20 (84.21%), winning all 11 of their top-flight home games in which they were leading at half-time. Unsurprisingly, last year’s runners-up are betting favorites here, especially considering they boast an almost perfect La Liga home record against Sevilla all the way back to 2002 (W15, D2).

Meanwhile, the visitors have established themselves as ‘late-drama’ kings in the early stage of the season. Indeed, both of their league triumphs so far this campaign have seen the winner arriving no earlier than the 90-minute mark. Additionally, all five of Sevilla’s La Liga goals scored/conceded this term have come in the second half of play, with four coming beyond the hour mark. Also, ‘Los Nervionenses’ take the field after avoiding defeat in eight consecutive league trips, last season included (W4, D4). Curiously, a clear majority (75%) of the matches during that eight-game sequence have produced over 2.5 goals (6/8), with 62.5% of them seeing both teams on the scoresheet.