Former Real Madrid midfielder Steve McManaman has given his predictions for the El Clasico match today.
He believes that although the home team is Barcelona, he backs Real Madrid to win this intense tie.
According to him, Real Madrid is much more put together when it comes to the defence and that might give them an edge over the Catalan club.
“I normally choose the victors by whoever is playing at home because it’s such an intense atmosphere in El Clásico,” said the La Liga ambassador, speaking at an event for LiveScore.
“At a lot of Spanish games the away fans are normally stuck as high as they possibly can at the top of the stadium, meaning you can only hear the home fans.
“If the game is at Madrid, I normally choose Real Madrid of course but if it’s at Barcelona I’d go for Barcelona.
“The way that both teams are playing at the minute I think Real Madrid is the better team and they look stronger defensively, so I would choose Real Madrid.”
However, he also feels that Barcelona will really fight back – so far the Blaugrana have had good results with a great squad – Messi being the most important one.
“Now the season has started and Barcelona has had decent results so far, I think they’ll be fine,” he said.
“When you look at the team and it has Philippe Coutinho, Antoine Griezmann, Lionel Messi, Ansu Fati – they’re good enough to challenge for the league.
“Lionel Messi has to stay fit because he drives them forward and scores the goals, but I think as a team they’ll want to prove that they’re not as bad as the 8-2 defeat against Bayern Munich. I think they’ll really knuckle down and do well this year.”
See More:Â El Clasico Head to Head since 2009: Records and Stats in the last 10 years!
