Espanyol vs Barcelona preview, prediction, team news, and head-to-head

Before the New Year break, both Barcelona and Espanyol are the only teams in La Liga top flight to win their last 5 out of 5 matches in the league and will be looking to start the new year on a positive note.

Espanyol sits 5th on the La Liga table with just 2 points below 4th-place Villarreal. The Catalan club sealed a 2-1 victory against Athletic Club in December to make it 5 wins in a row in the Spanish league.

While playing against Barcelona is a very big test, Manolo Gonzalez's men will have to put in the required effort to get a result at home.

Meanwhile, Barcelona last tasted defeat in November in a 3-0 loss against Chelsea in the Champions League. Since then, Hansi Flick and his boys have gone on to win 7 matches in a row in all competitions.

The Blaugrana enter the new year as La Liga leaders and will want to keep up with the 4 points gap ahead of second place Real Madrid. However, the defending champions will have to work more on their defence to avoid conceding cheap goals.

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FC Barcelona have shown superiority when it comes to the Catalan derbies and has not lost a single game in its last 28 meetings (D7). However, Espanyol have always found a way to score their visitors as 4 of their last 5 meetings ended with both teams getting on the score sheet.

Espanyol's Charles Pickel is still at the AFCON with his national team, following DR Congo's qualification to the round of 16. The host will also head into this match without Roman Terrats, who is out due to a muscular injury.

Manolo González will likely stick to the same formation and players he has been using, with Roberto Fernandez still being the spark in the middle of the field.

For Barcelona, Dani Olmo and Pedri are back in the team, which is a big boost for Hansi Flick. Ronald Araujo is also back after his time out from the squad due to personal reasons.

The German tactician has a star-studded attackers to choose from as Lamine Yamal, Rashford, Raphinha, and Ferran Torres are all available to start. Robert Lewandowski is also available to add more depth to the squad.

Espanyol (4-3-3): Dmitrovic; El Hilali, Calero, Cabrera, Romero; Gonzalez, Edu, Lozano; Dolan, Fernandez, Milla

​Barcelona (4-2-3-1): J Garcia; Kounde, Cubarsi, E Garcia, Balde; Pedri, De Jong; Yamal, Fermin, Raphinha; F Torres

Matches between Espanyol and Barca have been one-sided affairs, and we will likely experience the same in this fixture, despite both teams being on good forms. However, we expect the host team to have decent chances and even score goals.

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​Prediction: Espanyol 2-4 Barcelona

• Bet on Barcelona to win

• Over 3.5 goals

• Ferran Torres to score