Who starts for Real Madrid on Saturday? / Image by SoccerNews.com
Having won five of the last nine games against Barcelona in all competitions, Real Madrid are hoping their flying form will be prolonged at Camp Nou on Saturday as Los Blancos look to extend the gap on top of la Liga standings.
Red-hot Real
The only unbeaten team in the Spanish championship this season, Real Madrid have continued their perfect record of five wins in a row with a compelling Copa del Rey thumping of Leonesa (6-1).
Zinedine Zidane fielded a second-string squad which included his own blood, Enzo Zidane, who managed to get his name on the scoresheet in the process.
It was Mariano Diaz who stole the limelight however as the 23-year-old forward completed a hat-trick on the occasion to help his team to a morale-boosting win.
Turning their focus to La Liga again, Los Blancos will head to Barcelona with six-point advantage over their fierce rivals looking to extend the gap and make another giant leap towards winning the domestic title at the end of 2016-17 season.
Unbeaten since last April when they capitulated to Wolfsburg in the Champions League, Spanish royal cavalry continues to march full force ahead.
Anticipation Builds
Arguably two of the greatest football teams in the world have fans from all over the world wait in excitement for the game to begin.
Somewhat unusual timing of the game – Saturday afternoon – had perhaps been set to accommodate the vast viewership across the globe, but the Spanish football authorities did not count on the fact that this highly-anticipated clash will not be broadcasted in some parts of the world, most notably UK.
In order to avoid any discontent and annoyance, we have prepared the alternative for all of those fans who have been worried about possible being forced to miss tuning in the action at Camp Nou.
Simply follow THIS LINK if you want to get in line for the alternative way of making sure to get your eyes on the Barcelona vs Real Madrid clash.
It needs to be noted that viewers from the United Kingdom, United States, Canada and across Europe will all be able to gain access on the live stream throughout the platforms and devices.
As time to El Clasico winds down, the Soccer News team has prepared a predicted Real Madrid line-up we believe Zinedine Zidane will call upon to try and grab three points from the visit to Catalunya.
Read it through and share your comments as well:
Real Madrid predicted line-up / Image by SoccerNews.com
Defence
Having been involved in the mid-week Copa del Rey action against Leonesa, Francisco Casilla will surrender his place on goal to Zidane’s first choice Keylor Navas, who will stand proud behind the four-man defence wall.
Captain Sergio Ramos will be proud to wear his armband against Barcelona as he avoided being suspended for El Clasico, despite being only one booking away from a ban. Portugal defender Pepe did recover from his injury, but Zidane is likely to stick with in-form French shot blocker Raphael Varane alongside the captain in the heart of defence.
Dani Carvajal is a preferred option to not fully recovered Danilo on the right side of defence, whereas Marcelo remains the first-choice on the left.
Midfield
Zinedine Zidane received some good news seeing that Casemiro was able to make his comeback from injury and make an appearance in the 6-1 beating of Leonesa on Wednesday.
The Brazilian will still be left out of the starting line-up as Zidane is expected to stick with Mateo Kovacic, who has been in superb form alongside his Croatian compatriot Luka Modric in recent weeks.
Having successfully gone past the early season criticism, Isco has managed to get back in the good grace with his manager and was able to repay Zidane’s trust with impressive showings of late.
The Welsh Dragon Gareth Bale and his troublesome injury that is likely to keep him sidelined until April will force Zidane to go through a formation shift and include Lucas Vazquez in the starting line-up.
The winger is liklely to drop further back into a midfield slot in what is likely to be a 4-4-2 formation, rather than a usual 4-3-3 with Gareth Bale upfront.
Attack
La Liga top scorer and Ballon d’Or candidate Cristiano Ronaldo will lead the way in attack together with Karim Benzema, who looks for another chance to cement his starting line-up under Zinedine Zidane.
With ten goals to his name so far, Cristiano Ronaldo is untouchable upfront, whereas Benzema’s position will be relieved of pressure given that Alvaro Morata has picked a knock during international break and is still unavailable for selection.
Odds
One might be surprised to see that bookmakers have given Barcelona as much of a credit against in-form Los Blancos as to back Real Madrid with 3/1 betting odds for a win at Nou Camp.
Given the fact their most recent win ended in a 2-1 triumph, there is some great value in backing the visitors to claim the three point against Luis Enrique’s men on Saturday.
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