It didn’t take long for 2025 to bring us its first El Clasico. The Spanish Super Cup final will feature Barcelona and Real Madrid., the third consecutive time that the final has featured these teams, with each trading victories in 2023 and 2024. Since the final has moved to a four team format in 2020, it has been won by Barcelona or Real Madird and for the last three editions, the team to win the final has also gone on to lift the La Liga title at the end of the season.
While it’s a small sample size, it also goes to show that this match is anything but a standard exibishion. A Clasico always has stakes to these teams, even if it’s just to get a psychological edge, but with silverware on the line, it will always mean more.
Last meeting
These may be different teams than the last time that they met in October, but Barcelona will hope for a similar result. Hansi Flick’s men established themselves as true La Liga title contenders by winning that match by an impressive 4-0 score. Robert Lewandowski scored a brace and more importantly, Barcelona were able to keep a clean sheet against a top team. The match exposed some of the flaws in Carlo Ancelotti’s side which have now been shored up as Real Madrid is atop La Liga. It was a match that was closer than the score suggested and this is a chance to show their growth.
How they got here
In Saudi Arabia both teams have won their semifinal matches with shutout victories, but in quite different ways. Facing Athletic Club, Barcelona got out to a lead quickly via Gavi before controlling the game from start to finish. Lamine Yamal added the insurance goal to become the second youngest player to ever score in the competition behind only himself scoring against Osasuna last year. There’s a shortage of words to describe what Yamal is doing at only 17, but he’ll be a key figure in the final.
For Madrid, they had a slow start against Mallorca but once Jude Bellingham opened the scoring in the 63rd minute, the floodgates opened. Los Blancos forced an own goal and had Rodrygo score both in stoppage time to have a result that was more of a reflection of their dominance during the match. They’ll now look to carry that momentum into the final.
Clasico history
This match will be the 259th time that these two teams have met in an official competition in what has been a closet contested rivalry. Barcelona has 101 wins while Real Madrid has 105 and the duo have drawn another 52 matches. Even when it comes to goals, the stats are close with Barcelona scoring 423 and Real Madrid scoring 433. In the Spanish Super Cup specifically, this will be the 18th meeting but Real Madrid has had the advantage in this competition winning 10 matches, drawing two, and losing five to Barcelona. Barcelona is the most successful team in Super Cup history winning it 14 times but Real Madrid can level things with a victory to add to their 13 titles in the competition.
Registration gate
During this tournament, Barcelona has been dealing with a now-resolved issue concerning the registration of Dani Olmo and Pau Victor. Both players were registered for the seaon due to a provision allowing Barcelona to use 80% of the salary due to an injured player. The issue is that the registration only lasted until December 31 to provide Barcelona time to either secure new revenue streams or find other ways to comply with financial regulations. While Barcelona did complete a deal to sell luxury seating at the Spotify Camp Nou, the Monitoring Committee of the RFEF-La Liga Coordination Agreement deemed that the duo still couldn’t be registered because Barcelona couldn’t show that they had received funds from that deal in time. This has now been resolved in the courts to register both for La Liga play, but that doesn’t mean that Barcelona is out of the woods yet.
Star attacker Raphinha spoke about how this could impact deals for future players and while that fallout remains to be seen, it is quite an issue that Barcelona couldn’t guarantee a player’s registration for an entire season without needing to launch multiple appeals. When issues like this have been cropping up since COVID, there’s no telling when Barcelona’s finances will be in order.
Can Mbappe be the guy?
After signing Kylian Mbappe, Real Madrid were expected to dominate global soccer and while they’re still managing well, this isn’t quite the runaway that was expected. A natural left winger, Mbappe has often taken up spaces that are occupied by Vinicius Junior for Los Blancos, leading to a sputtering attack for Madrid. There have been moments where he has shown that he can but they have been anything but consistent. With 13 goals and three assists in 26 appearances across all competitions, Mbappe has been far off his usual scoring rate and he has also already missed two penalties this season.
On the bright side, Mbappe doesn’t have to be exactly the same guy that he was at Paris Saint-Germain in order for Real Madrid to win, but given their current setup, he does have to embrace being the star number nine and taking up central positions on the pitch. That adjustment has been happening but it will take time to shed being a left winger from his DNA.
Prediction
This is a match that will be fascinating because Barcelona’s offside trap has been effective in defending, but when it breaks down they can be quite vulnerable. Mbappe is also a player who enjoys playing off the back shoulder of a defense, so he’s prone to being caught offside by a disciplined defense. But by doing that, Barcelona also open themselves up to threats like Federico Valverde dropping the ball over the top or taking long shots to test them. If Real Madrid can contain Yamal from running the flanks of the clash, there’s certainly a route to victory but it’ll be a closely contested affair between the duo. Score: Real Madrid 3, Barcelona 2
Staff Picks
How to watch and odds
- Date: Sunday, Jan. 12 | Time: 2 p.m. ET
- Location: King Abdullah Sports City — Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
- TV: ABC | Live stream: Fubo TV (Try for free)
- Odds: Real Madrid +130; Draw +260; Barcelona +160
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