MADRID — In a tight match on Sunday, Barcelona secured a narrow 1-0 victory over Alaves, with Robert Lewandowski scoring the decisive goal in the second half. This win brings Barcelona within four points of their arch-rivals Real Madrid, who suffered defeat against Espanyol over the weekend, ending a remarkable streak of 10 wins in their last 11 games across all competitions.
Currently sitting in third place, Barcelona is just three points behind Atletico Madrid, who reclaimed their position with a solid 2-0 win against Mallorca, snapping a brief two-match winless streak in the league.
Lewandowski expressed the urgency of the match, stating, “We knew we had to win this match. We needed the victory. We had lost too many points in the league already.” With this goal, Lewandowski has now scored in four consecutive matches and boasts an impressive total of seven goals in his last eight appearances.
The crucial goal came from close range following a volley by Lamine Yamal, which deflected off a defender. This game marked a rare instance of Barcelona scoring only one goal, especially following a dominating streak where they netted 14 times in their previous three matches, including a stunning 7-1 victory against Valencia.
“It’s not every time that we will be able to score three, four or five goals in a game,” Lewandowski noted. “We had to be patient and in the end, we did what we had to do, which was to score one more goal than our opponent.” On the other side, Alaves faced a tough day, failing to register any shots on target and remaining in the relegation zone. They have only managed one victory in their last eleven outings across all competitions.
In terms of player safety, Barcelona’s Gavi and Alaves’ Tomás Conechny both had to leave the match in the first half due to an unfortunate head collision that occurred about ten minutes into the game at Montjuic stadium. Gavi managed to exit the field on his own, but Conechny required assistance and was transported to a local hospital for further evaluation. There has been no immediate update regarding his condition.
