FC Barcelona 4-0 Real Valladolid: Another four-midable display

FC Barcelona had made heavy work of their first two league fixtures but Sunday 28 at the Spotify Camp Nou brought a very comfortable victory indeed over newly promoted Real Valladolid.

Before another huge crowd of almost 84,000, this was the night that Jules Kounde finally got to make his blaugrana debut. And a mightily impressive one it was too, although it was a faultless performance from everyone involved as Barça cruised to a 4-0 win.

Lewy does it again

Robert Lewandowski had already had one effort almost inexplicably hit the post rather than the back of the net before he put Barça into the driving seat after24 minutes of constant Barça pressure.

Raphinha sent a lively-looking floater into the danger zone, and the Polish striker cleverly got in behind the defence to connect with his raised foot at the far post. A very fine piece of poaching, and a thoroughly deserved lead for the Catalans.

Comfortable and confident

Ousmane Dembélé, who had also rattled one onto the woodwork, set up goal number two on the frontier of half-time. After sweetly working himself into position for a shot, the Frenchman instead spotted that nobody was picking up Pedri coming through. The latter made it look easy as he stroked the ball past former Barça man Jordi Masip in the Valladolid goal.

Two goals up at the break, and with very little threat from the visitors, Barça looked very nicely set up for a routine three points.

And that's a wrap!

There simply wasn’t a real contest as Barça utterly dominated without even needing to find top gear. They eventually extended their lead with a simply amazing finish from Lewandowski. Dembélé did the build-up, and the goal itself was the most audacious of back-heels. Simply sublime from a man who now has four goals from his first three games.

Despite a series of chances to end their 18-year wait for a goal in this stadium, solid defending and some fine goalkeeping from Ter Stegen made sure that Valladolid went home empty handed.

Instead, it was Barça who ended up adding a fourth shortly before the end. Masip denied Lewandowski a hat-trick as he turned the ball onto the crossbar, but Sergi Roberto was right on the rebound to round off a fabulous evening.

Next up for Barça is a trip to Sevilla on Saturday at 9pm CEST.