Sports Blog 11/08/2015: UEFA Super Cup Preview – Barcelona vs Sevilla, Tuesday 11th August 2015

With the Premier League getting underway at the weekend, Spanish fans have a big longer to wait until La Liga kicks off. They do, however, have an all-Spanish UEFA Super Cup tonight to look forward to, as Barcelona face Sevilla at 7.45pm on BT Sport Europe.

Since, obviously, the game is guaranteed a Spanish winner, it will be the 9th time in 15 years that a Spanish club has won the UEFA Super Cup. In that same period only England and Italy have seen multiple winners (Liverpool and Milan twice respectively) with Germany’s Bayern Munich and Russia’s Zenit St Petersburg rounding out proceedings. Even more impressively, this is the second all-Spanish final in a row, cementing the dominance of La Liga over its European league rivals.



Anyway, onto the teams involved, and fresh off arguably their best season in decades Sevilla go into their second Super Cup final in a row, after becoming the most successful side in UEFA Cup/Europa League history by winning their fourth title against Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk last season. They actually lost last year’s Super Cup 2-0 to Real Madrid, but encouragingly the only time they have won the cup came against Barcelona, with Sevilla winning 3-0 back in 2006.

They might find victory more difficult this year, however. Sevilla just lost their top scorer for the past 2 season, Carlos Bacca, to AC Milan, whilst star winger Aleix Vidal sealed a summer transfer to Barcelona themselves. In order to bolster their squad, Sevilla have taken Steven N’Zonzi from Stoke (who will miss the Super Cup final with gastroenteritis), Adil Rami from Milan (also likely to be out with a stomach bug) and Gael Kakuta from Chelsea. Their most important signing, however, could be Ciro Immobile, on loan from Borussia Dortmund. After being electric at Torino, Immobile struggled to make a difference in Germany; he has big (Bacca) boots to fill in Spain, but could be key to Sevilla’s season if he finds his form early. The Italian goes into the Super Cup final at a Player Markets spread of 11-14 with 17/2 fixed odds to score first.



Of course, Sevilla face an unenviable task in taking on the Treble-winning Barcelona. Barca are going into the new La Liga season at 8/13 odds on favourites to lift the title (in comparison Sevilla are 80/1), and are easily the preferred side ahead of Tuesday night’s match. They last won the Super Cup back in 2011, beating Porto 2-0, and would got level with AC Milan on 5 title each if they were victorious in Tbilisi. Barca also have another champions-cup on the horizon, playing in the 2 legs of the Supercopa de Espana against Athletic Bilbao on Friday and Monday in a repeat of the 2015 Copa del Rey final. Incidentally, Barca then play Bilbao in their opening game of the season the following Sunday.

Tuesday will also be Barca’s first competitive game since captain Xavi, winner of 8 La Liga titles and 4 Champions Leagues (among countless other cups and personal awards) in a 17 year career with the Catalan side. The Spaniard left for Qatari side Al Sadd as his contract came to its end, with the intention of also serving as an ambassador for the ultra-controversial 2022 World Cup. In terms of the transfer market, despite a ban Barca have still be busy, signing Arda Turan for €34 million from Atletico Madrid and the aforementioned Aleix Vidal for €18 million. It shows the power of Barca’s draw that these players still decided to move to the Catalan club despite the fact they won’t be able to play competitively until the New Year, when the side’s transfer ban is lifted.

Barca will be without Neymar (and Jordi Alba) on Tuesday night, but with Lional Messi and Luis Suarez fit it likely won’t matter. The Argentine magician, fresh off of a semi-final reaching Copa America over the summer, is at a Player Markets spread of 50-54 and favourite to score first at 12/5, whilst the toothy Uruguayan is at a spread of 28-31 with fixed odds of 17/1 to nab the opening goal.

The last 2 meetings between Sevilla and Barcelona have ended in a 2-2 draw back in April, and a 5-1 demolition by Barca back in November. This followed 4-1 and 3-2 victories for the Catalan club the season before, understandably leading our Spreadex traders to offer an unusually high Total Goals spread of 3.35-3.55, alongside a Barcelona/Sevilla Goal Supremacy spread of 1.55-1.75.