It’s the biggest derby in soccer, maybe the biggest league match in the world, and it always feels like it’s played in a state of motion. You can’t just talk about Real Madrid and Barcelona as they are — El Clasico is forever about these storied clubs as they were and will be, too. (They face off Sunday, Oct. 16, 10:15 a.m. ET, on ESPN2.)
You can’t talk about Barcelona without referencing and weighing the wild spending spree they went on this summer. Despite having the best team in LaLiga over the second half of last season, despite stomping Real Madrid 4-0 in March and despite crippling debt issues that forced the departure of Lionel Messi last August, the club sold future television revenue and part of the club’s in-house production company to afford the acquisition of seven new players, only two of whom have yet become primary starters. (And because the Transfer Industrial Complex never pauses for even a second, there are already rumors of them trying to figure out how to bring Messi back next summer.)
Thanks to a pair of poor performances against Inter Milan, they are now staring elimination — and the deprivation of the money that comes with appearances in the Champions League knockout rounds — in the face. That colors everything we say about Barcelona in the process, too.
– Real Madrid vs. Barcelona on ESPN+ (Sunday, Oct. 16, 10:15 a.m. ET)
Meanwhile, you can’t talk about Real Madrid without referencing future Galacticos. A week’s worth of “Erling Haaland has a special release clause for Real Madrid?” headlines came out of nowhere last week, and after only a brief respite, the “Kylian Mbappe to Madrid?” rumors have started all over again. It seems it’s rarely about who Real Madrid has; it’s always about who they’re going to have.
That’s a shame because if we were to simply pause time and stay in the present tense, we’d be looking at what is, on paper, about as even a matchup as you could want for any match, much less the derby of all derbies. El Clasico kicks off in Madrid’s Estadio Santiago Bernabeu this Sunday, and it could be an absolute delight.
