Luis Suarez made his Barcelona debut a year ago and he celebrated it in style by scoring a hat-trick for Barca as they beat Eibar 3-1.
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FC Barcelona on Friday morning held its penultimate training before facing Eibar on Sunday in the ninth round of La Liga, with the participation of midfield talisman Andres Iniesta, having recovered from his hamstring injury.
Before the game, the Barcelona players had come out on the pitch wearing t-shirts in support of club legend Johan Cruyff.
The Blaugrana are coming off two wins in a week, with a 5-2 victory over Rayo Vallecano, which saw Brazilian winger Neymar score four goals and midweek when they travel to Minsk, Belarus to take on BATE Borisov where they won 2-0 off a brace from Croatian midfielder Ivan Rakitic.
The Catalan club, Celta and Real are locked in the top three spots in the table after eight matches, but Luis Enrique’s men can move to the top spot if the result in the other match ends in a draw.
“We went behind again, which complicated the game and it is something we have to start looking at”.
Despite the Argentina star missing the game with Eibar due to a knee injury, club captain Dani Garcia expects a supremely tough test at Camp Nou and has challenged his team-mates to be fearless on the ball.
Rakitic is one of six Barcelona players to have been named on FIFA’s 23-man shortlist for the 2015 Ballon d’Or, for which Lionel Messi remains the current favourite.
And the Camp Nou was stunned early on as Barca conceded first for the eighth time this season when on-loan Atletico Madrid striker Baston swept home his sixth goal of the campaign after Claudio Bravo had blocked Keko’s initial attempt.
Jose Luis Mendilibar: “Our first half [against Sevilla] was good, we played well”.
Eibar have been a solid unit on their travels this season as they are unbeaten in their four matches away from the Estadio Municipal de Ipurua, winning twice and drawing twice.
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This week it is Luis Suarez with a hat-trick against Eibar to give them the lead. Asier Riesgo is expected to take his position between the posts with Mauro dos Santos, Aleksandar Pantic, Ander Capa and David Junca playing in the defence.
