Five key stats from Girona 0-1 Barcelona

Barcelona played their second Catalan derby in less than a month when they visited Girona in gameweek 19 of La Liga.

They had the chance to bury – even if temporarily – Real Madrid six points beneath them, and were successful in their task as Pedri’s winner garnered all three points.

It was a less-than-ideal performance, though. Barcelona found it difficult to break the deadlock for the most part and only a moment of brilliance from Jordi Alba unlocked the scoreboard at the hour mark.

As Xavi explained during his post-game press conference, Barcelona put in a scrappy performance against a good opposition and got the three points. He was also firm in mentioning that this is not the way forward for the club and that they have to strive to improve more.

They have set an impressive run of results recently, though. Barcelona have played the most games without a single defeat across all competitions in 2023, registering eight wins in this time.

In fact, Barça are undefeated since 26th October, when they took on Bayern Munich at Camp Nou in the UEFA Champions League. Since then, they have won 12 games and drawn one — 1-1 vs Espanyol.

A large part of the credit goes to none other than Marc-Andre ter Stegen, who kept yet another clean sheet tonight. While he was largely untested vs Girona, it takes him to a mammoth 14 clean sheets in 18 games in La Liga.

Today’s game-winner, Pedri, has been on the scoresheet in three of his last four games. The goal vs Girona was particularly special, though, as it was the Spaniard’s 100th appearance for Barcelona.

His goals have been clutch throughout his tenure, too, with nine of the last 11 coming as either go-ahead goals/winners (6) or equalisers (3).

Barcelona will now look towards the game against Real Betis in midweek at the Benito Villamarin, before they take on Sevilla at Camp Nou next weekend.