A dominant Barcelona routs Valencia

With the win, Barcelona climb back into Champions League places

On paper, the match between Barcelona and Valencia looked to be a difficult one for the Catalans. Despite being 12th in LaLiga, Valencia is no pushover, especially at home.

But in perhaps the Catalans’ best performance in the Xavi Hernandez era, Barcelona left the Mestalla with a 4-1 victory.

Particularly in the first half, it was vintage Barcelona. They were able to maintain possession and had Valencia on the back foot.

The Blaugrana dominance paid off midway through the opening half.

Jordi Alba delivered a sensational long pass to Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. The former Arsenal forward controlled the ball, took a touch and slammed it past the Valencia kicker. It was one-way football at its finest and marked Aubameyang’s first goal with his new club.

Barcelona doubled its lead almost 10 minutes later in a more traditional style. It was Alba again who delivered a beautiful pass over the top of the Valencia defense to Ousmane Dembele. The Frenchman then cut a pass inside to Frenkie de Jong who only needed to push the ball into the back of the net.

It was a nice bit of play from the Catalans as they moved through Sergiño Dest and Sergio Busquets before the ball found its way to Alba.

But they weren’t done as only six minutes after De Jong scored, Aubameyang would get his brace.

In another display of brilliant football, Dest laid the ball off to Dembele who sliced a pass to Gavi inside the box. The 17-year-old then set himself up nicely to deliver a low cross to Aubameyang who tapped it in.

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Barcelona went into the break leading by three.

However, the second half doldrums continued as Valencia managed to get one back. There was a 10-15 minute spell where it looked like the home team were going to get back into the game.

Sensing the shift in momentum, Xavi decided to change things up and brought on Pedri for De Jong. His change proved to be a master stroke as Pedri delivered the dagger in the 63rd minute to put Barcelona up 4-1.

The 19-year-old took advantage of a loose ball and struck it well from outside the box. It might have taken a bit of a deflection off the back of Aubameyang but it was Pedri’s second goal in as many games and has seemingly added goal scoring to an already abundant repertoire.

Barcelona were able to hold back any more spurts from Valencia to take all 3 points in a 4-1 victory. The win pushes Barcelona back to fourth place in LaLiga but with a game in hand over Atletico Madrid and Villarreal. They’re only two points back of Real Betis in third place.

Again, it was one of the best performances under Xavi and not simply because of the scoreline. A number of players who were under the microscope performed well. Dest had his best game in a while and did well to minimize the runs by Bryan Gil.

Despite not being his usual explosive self, Dembele had an assist on the second goal and the pre-assist in the third. He also helped out defensively and showed he can still contribute and isn’t letting his contract situation distract him on the pitch.

Oscar Mingueza, who replaced Eric Garcia at the break, looked shaky at first then grew into the game.

But the headlines are going to focus on Aubameyang who scored his first two goals as a Barcelona player. The club lacked a proper goal scorer and the Gabon striker showed he hasn’t lost his finishing touch.

Barcelona needed a win like this following the midweek draw against Napoli in the Europa League. With the return leg in Italy set for Thursday, this display is certain to build confidence. Especially for those in the attack.