It has been a very tight title race so far and both these sides enter this matchday with hopes of lifting the trophy.
There will be several duels to watch in the match and one of the most interesting will be fought on the benches. These are two teams with clear leaders in the dugouts, in Hansi Flick and Diego Simeone. Both sides play with a clear style, and this match pits the highest-scoring team in the championship against the team to have conceded the fewest goals.
Two contrasting styles of play
Both Flick and Simeone have very different ways of understanding football, although they do boast some similarities. These are two coaches who like to attack vertically and with speed, looking for the opposition’s spaces. The big difference between the two teams is in the way they defend, with FC Barcelona always going forward but with Los Rojiblancos preferring to sit closer to their area in a more orderly way, closing off the spaces so that the opposition can’t get the ball inside and create danger.
FC Barcelona come into the game as the top-scoring team in the division with 71 goals scored in 26 matches, which is practically an average of three goals per game. They look for the opposition goal by probing with Dani Olmo and Pedri, by moving opposition defenders around and by getting the ball to their talented front three of Lamine Yamal, Raphinha and Robert Lewandowski. They also play a high defensive line, with Marc Casadó pressing and with the centre-backs looking to catch the opposing forwards offside.
Meanwhile, Atlético de Madrid are the LALIGA EA SPORTS team with the best goals-against record, with 18 goals conceded in 27 games, equivalent to 0.67 per game, highlighting the solidity of Los Rojiblancos. The Argentinian coach has made some changes to his system this season and his back line is more organised, with the defenders supporting the wingers in two well-defined lines of four. The introductions of Clement Lenglet and Javi Galán at the back, and of Giuliano Simeone to help in attack and defence, have made Atleti better able to halt opposition attacks.
The third meeting of these coaches this season
Flick and Simeone first met in the 2020/21 Champions League in the group stage, where Flick’s Bayern Munich won one of the matches and where those two clubs drew the other. The first meeting was at the Allianz Arena, where the German side ran out convincing 4-0 winners over Simeone’s charges. In the return match at the Riyadh Air Metropolitano, it was a 1-1 draw in a game where Atlético de Madrid were battling to go through against an already-qualified Bayern Munich.
Then, they’ve faced off twice already this season. In their first LALIGA EA SPORTS duel of the year, Atlético de Madrid stunned the Estadi Olímpic just before Christmas, when a late Alexander Sørloth goal earned Los Colchoneros a 2-1 road victory. These two sides faced off again at the Estadi Olímpic just last month, this time in the Copa del Rey and this time playing out a memorable 4-4 draw, with a second leg to come in April. Simeone and Flick face off again in LALIGA EA SPORTS this Sunday night, with each coach having won one, lost one and drawn two of their previous four direct head-to-head chess matches so far.