Match Preview : Rayo Vallecano VS Barça

Not far on from our last game, we’re quickly back in La Liga action. This time against Rayo Vallecano. Live from 9:30pm local time. It’s yet another one of those tricky games early on in the season, especially away from home. We always seem to struggle against Rayo away from home. The pitch is narrow and the fans are close to the action too which means a hostile and difficult atmosphere is always expected. One good thing to look at is the fact that we’re getting this tricky away fixture out of the way early on in the season. We’re going to have to be at our very best to get a result from Rayo. Which is why it was vitally important that we not only beat Athletic club on the weekend, but we also put in a very good performance too. It’s early on and of course there’s still a lot of work to do. Improvements are still there to be made. But we arrive to this game in a good moment, with confidence and we need to keep building on that. 

A Quick Look at our opponents:

As we know, Rayo Vallecano, Home or away are always a tricky customer. They’re always very solid defensively and even if you feel like you’re creating enough chances, it never seems it’s enough. They’ve got great technical players and a wealth of experience in La Liga too. They’re unbeaten so far in the league, and although it’s still too early to really get a gauge as to how good all these teams are yet, it’s still been a solid start for the Madrid based side. 

Predicted lineup:

As it’s been a very quick turn around from our last game, I’d imagine Flick may opt to go for a few changes in the starting lineup for the game tonight against Rayo. Not too many changes because it’s important to keep things consistent, but it’s also vitally important to keep the whole squad fresh. We’re still without the same players as were against Athletic Club, but still, I can Imagine seeing one or two changes. One player who will most likely return to the starting lineup is Marc Casado. He was rested against Athletic Club so I could see him getting back into the team. Possibly in place of Ferran.

My starting 11:

Ter Stegen

Kounde- Cubarsi- Iñigo- Balde

Casado- Bernal

Yamal- Pedri- Raphinha 

Lewandwoski 

Ryan Edwards