Barcelona collapse
The race for the Spanish League title in the current 2024-2025 season has heated up after the mixed results achieved by the top three, Atletico Madrid, Real Madrid and Barcelona, in the past rounds.
Barcelona was forced to give up the lead in La Liga after losing to Atletico the day before yesterday, Saturday, and now finds itself in third place, having been at the top alone since the beginning of the season, but its shocking results in recent weeks have allowed the two Madrid teams to catch up and then overtake it.
Under the title "The Championship Returns", the Spanish newspaper "AS" highlighted the fluctuations in the La Liga table, attributing the reasons for this to the results achieved by Atletico Madrid, Real Madrid and Barcelona in the last seven rounds.
The newspaper said, "The situation was bleak for Real Madrid after losing the Clasico to Barcelona 0-4. The Catalan team found itself ahead of the Merengue by 6 points, then increased to 9 after defeating Espanyol and postponing the Royal Club's match against Valencia due to the storm that hit eastern Spain."
"In the same round in which Barcelona beat Real Madrid, Atletico were losing there at the Benito Villarmin Stadium against Real Betis by a score of 0-1," she added.
While Barcelona looked terrifying and an extraordinary candidate to win the title this season, the team itself had a different opinion, and allowed its pursuers to catch up with it first and then overtake it.
After beating Espanyol 3-1 in the 12th round of La Liga, Barcelona played 7 matches, winning one, drawing two and losing four, meaning it collected 5 points out of 21.
At the same time, Real Madrid was achieving positive results, as the royal team won 5 times, drew once and lost once in the seven matches mentioned, to collect 15 points out of 21, an increase of 11 points over its rival Barcelona.
As for the best results, they were for Atletico Madrid, who achieved 7 full victories, meaning it collected the full mark (21/21).
The statistics also favor the two capital teams over Barcelona, as Real Madrid scored 20 goals (2.85 goals per game) and conceded 7 goals in 3 games (Athletic Bilbao, Rayo Vallecano and Sevilla), while leaving the other four games with a clean sheet.
The opposite was the case for Barcelona, who scored 11 goals (almost half of them in the Mallorca match), while the team's net shook 11 times, and did not keep a clean sheet in any of the seven games mentioned.
As for Atletico Madrid, who found themselves in fourth place after losing to Real Betis, they are on their way to the top, having scored 17 goals and conceded only 5.
Atletico Madrid lead the Spanish league table with 41 points, one point ahead of Real Madrid, who jumped to second place, while Barcelona dropped to third place with 38 points.
Atletico and Real Madrid have played one less game than Barcelona, which means the gap could increase if Los Rojiblancos and Real Madrid win both.
AS believes that Athletic Bilbao, who are currently fourth with 36 points, cannot be underestimated in any way, having collected 17 points in their last seven games.
The newspaper added, "The title battle is still alive between four teams, anything can happen in the future, and what seemed impossible at the end of October (after Barcelona won the Clasico) has now changed, Barcelona have collapsed and Real Madrid and Atletico have become bolder."