Ousmane Dembélé and Toni Kroos, during the classic past at the Bernabéu. /
Madrid will host Barça five days after facing Shakhtar in Warsaw, so they will have more time than the Catalans to prepare for the match
The first classic of the 2022-2023 season will be played at the Santiago Bernabéu on Sunday, October 16, starting at 4:15 p.m., and will be broadcast exclusively on DAZN. Real Madrid will host Barcelona on matchday nine of the League five days after facing Shakhtar in Warsaw in the Champions League, so they will have more time to prepare for the classic, since the Catalans will play Inter Milan at the Camp Nou on the 12th of the same month.
LaLiga has set the duel between the eternal rivals of Spanish football in the early afternoon of Sunday, October 16, so that it can be followed in the United States and Latin America, as well as in much of Asia. Madrid-Barça will arrive marked by the precedent of last season, when Barça thrashed the whites 0-4 on March 20, already with Xavi Hernández on the bench and without Karim Benzema in the champion’s ranks, since the French striker was injured.
By October 16, Carlo Ancelotti’s team will already have Benzema, who will surely reappear on Sunday against Osasuna, while Barça will be without Ronald Araujo or Jules Koundé. The Uruguayan defender could even miss the World Cup in Qatar, since Araujo’s absence could last a month and a half, after suffering an adductor injury in his right thigh with his national team. In the case of the Frenchman, he suffers an injury to the femoral biceps of his left thigh and will be away from the pitch for about a month.
Without Araujo or Koundé, Barça will therefore only have three pure central defenders (Eric García, Christensen and Piqué) to face Real Madrid, who, barring setbacks in the next matches or training sessions, will have all their troops in attack. Among them, apart from Benzema, Vinicius, Rodrygo, Asensio and Hazard.
