La Liga leaders Barcelona lost 1-0 to Leganes on Sunday, with defender Sergio Gonzalez’s early header stunning the hosts, who lost a second straight league match in front of their own fans.
Although Barcelona have performed admirably in the Champions League with five wins in six games, Barcelona have been struggling in the league for over a month, with just one win in their last six league games.
Barca remains top of the La Liga table with 38 points, level with Atletico Madrid – who host on Saturday – and one point ahead of third-placed Real Madrid, with both of its title rivals having a game in hand.
It was Leganes’ first ever victory against Barcelona, ​​and it moved Leganes to 15th place in the table with 18 points.
Leganes took the lead from a corner after four minutes when visiting captain Gonzalez rose unmarked at the near post and fired an unstoppable header past goalkeeper Inaki Pena.
Barca immediately shot to equalize, but despite dominating throughout the match and having over 80% of the ball, they were clueless as they tried to overcome Leganes’ disciplined and well-organized five-man defense, denying several opportunities.
He missed the target on 16 of his 20 shots in the match, and when he did, he hit the wall against Leganes goalkeeper Marko Dmitrovic, who made three spectacular saves in the first half.
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The 32-year-old Serbian goalkeeper made a phenomenal reflex and in the 10th minute blocked Robert Lewandowski’s shot after a great individual play by Raphina on the left wing.
Then, in the 33rd minute, he worked his magic with a phenomenal Raphinha volley hitting the crossbar, and a few minutes later he attacked again, blocking Lewandowski’s shot when the striker was one-on-one.
The hosts’ frustration mounted after the break and they missed several chances, with Dani Olmo, Lamine Yamal and Raphinha wasting good chances, while Lewandowski and Jules Kounde missed playmakers from close range.
“It’s impossible for us to go home happy after what happened today,” said a visibly frustrated Pedri DAZN.
“We didn’t have the spark we needed in attack to score goals and we need to get into games better. We can’t allow our opponents to score goals like this at the beginning. I think we created chances, but we need to know how to finish the game. It’s difficult to find an explanation why we have problems in LaLiga, but we have to move on,” he added.
