Five-star Barca smash Real Madrid to win Spanish Super Cup
Barcelona's team president Joan Laporta celebrates with the trophy after winning the Spanish Super Cup final football match between Real Madrid and Barcelona at the King Abdullah Sport City in Jeddah on January 12, 2025. (Photo by Haitham AL-SHUKAIRI / AFP)
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Barcelona hammered
rivals Real Madrid 5-2 in a wild Spanish Super Cup Clasico final in Saudi
Arabia on Sunday to win the first trophy of the Hansi Flick era.
Kylian Mbappe put Madrid
ahead but a dominant Barcelona hit five in response before their goalkeeper
Wojciech Szczesny was sent off in the second half.
Madrid were hoping to
avenge their 4-0 home defeat by Barcelona in October's La Liga Clasico but
instead were left battered and bruised by their arch-rivals in Jeddah.
After Mbappe's opener,
Lamine Yamal levelled and Robert Lewandowski sent Barcelona ahead from the
penalty spot, with Raphinha bagging a brace and Alejandro Balde also on target.
Rodrygo Goes pulled one
back for Madrid with a free-kick but they could not capitalise further on their
numerical advantage in a humiliating defeat for the European champions.
"I think today is a
good day because we beat one of the best teams in the world, for the second
time this season, Real Madrid, and this is unbelievable," Flick told
reporters.
"We won a title here
and we are really happy... today is a day to look positively at this
team."
Real Madrid coach Carlo
Ancelotti said his team's poor defending was the main reason for the heavy
defeat.
"We defended badly
and that cost us the game -- they found their goals quite easily,"
Ancelotti told Movistar.
"We're sad, like
all our fans, it's disappointing and we don't have to hide that... we have to
look forwards, there's nothing else we can do."
Despite a strong
Barcelona opening salvo it was Real Madrid who took the lead in the fifth
minute with Mbappe's brilliant goal on the counter-attack.
The French forward,
frustrated numerous times by the offside flag in the league defeat by the
Catalans, broke loose on the halfway line after Vinicius won the ball back and,
after bursting into the area, clipped past Szczesny.
It took a stunning
individual goal from 17-year-old Yamal to level the scoreline, with the Spanish
winger cutting in from the right before stroking home a low finish inside the
near post in a similar style to former Barca great Lionel Messi, to whom he is
often compared.
Barcelona kept pushing
and moved ahead through Lewandowski's penalty after Eduardo Camavinga arrived
late and carelessly clattered Gavi.
Raphinha soon added
Barcelona's third with a header from Kounde's cross from deep and they grabbed
their fourth before half-time on the break.
Yamal and Raphinha
combined and the latter slipped in Balde, who slotted past Courtois.
Barcelona continued in
the same vein after the break and Raphinha netted the fifth with a neat dribble
and finish after Marc Casado played him in.
The Catalans were
reduced to 10 men when Mbappe sped in at the other end, rounding goalkeeper Szczesny,
who brought him down outside the area and after a VAR review was dismissed.
Rodrygo, who earlier hit
the post, rifled home the free-kick past Szczesny's replacement Inaki Pena.
Mbappe brilliantly teed
up Jude Bellingham but the England international was denied by a superb Jules
Kounde challenge in stoppage time.
The French forward also
came close to scoring again himself on a fine individual display but Pena
tipped away his effort.
"He was the best
(Madrid player)," said Ancelotti, noting an improvement after Mbappe's
hit-and-miss start to life at the club following his switch from Paris
Saint-Germain.
"We can't always
win, if we have to lose a cup, it's better that it's this one," said
veteran Madrid midfielder Luka Modric.
Barcelona brought on playmaker
Dani Olmo for his first appearance since he was registered to play for the club
on a temporary basis, a controversial issue which overshadowed the semi-finals
earlier in the week.
However their five-star
display offered a host of other talking points as Barca won a record-extending
15th Spanish Super Cup.
"It's really nice, it had been a season since we won a trophy, it's always special and on top of that in a Clasico against Real Madrid," Barcelona defender Kounde told Movistar.

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