The cover of Sport ran something even more scary on Monday morning. Leo Messi, it reported, won’t make it back for the clásico in 19 days’ time after all. It is not, Sport say, that he has suffered a setback in his recovery from a knee injury picked up against Las Palmas on 26 September but that things are moving a little slower than anticipated and, with their counterparts at El Mundo Deportivo not ruling him out but also sounding pessimistic, insisting that Barcelona won’t take any risks, the countdown to the clásico becomes even more fraught. Yet rather than render that “they’re scary” headline irrelevant, the news about Messi underlined how important it is. Just how important they are.
On the morning after Messi’s injury, one headline summed it up. “Gulp!” it said. In Madrid they were delighted; here, many thought, was a chance to open up a gap. It hasn’t worked out that way. Messi fell injured in the third minute against Las Palmas, damaging his knee ligaments. Barcelona won 2-1 that day, Luis Suárez getting both, and since Messi hit the floor Barcelona have played eight times winning six, losing one (at Sevilla) and drawing one, an irrelevant 0-0 draw in the Copa del Rey, played with a B team. Beat Villarreal at the Camp Nou this weekend and in the worst-case scenario they’ll reach the clásico joint leaders with Madrid, who travel to Sevilla – the one place where Barcelona have been beaten in Messi’s absence.
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