{"id":8620,"date":"2023-11-13T04:17:16","date_gmt":"2023-11-12T22:47:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/baysidesports.com\/football\/2023\/11\/13\/lewandowski-rescues-barca-and-ends-drought-with-alaves-double\/"},"modified":"2023-11-13T04:17:16","modified_gmt":"2023-11-12T22:47:16","slug":"lewandowski-rescues-barca-and-ends-drought-with-alaves-double","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baysidesports.com\/football\/2023\/11\/13\/lewandowski-rescues-barca-and-ends-drought-with-alaves-double\/","title":{"rendered":"Lewandowski rescues Barca and ends drought with Alaves double"},"content":{"rendered":"

Barcelona striker Robert Lewandowski ended his barren goalscoring spell with a brace to guide the Spanish champion to a 2-1 win over Alaves in La Liga on Sunday.<\/p>\n

Samu Omorodion sent the visitors ahead in the first half against a dire Barcelona, but Lewandowski\u2019s second-half double rescued three points for the host.<\/p>\n

The victory keeps Barcelona in touching distance of shock leader Girona, four points ahead, and second place Real Madrid, with a two-point advantage, after both won Saturday.<\/p>\n

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Veteran forward Lewandowski scored a brilliant header early in the second half and thrashed home a penalty in the 77th minute to reach seven league goals.<\/p>\n

Catalonia is in drought, and Lewandowski was enduring one too, with the striker on his worst stretch of form for over a decade, having failed to score in six appearances prior.<\/p>\n

Barcelona is also on its own miserable run of performances.<\/p>\n

Xavi said the team was not in crisis despite the recent Clasico defeat and a stumble against Shakhtar Donetsk in the Champions League and that it was up to him to bring the team out of their slump.<\/p>\n

The coach handed midfielder Pedri Gonzalez his first start after injury, deployed Joao Cancelo at left-back for the first time and brought 16-year-old starlet Lamine Yamal back into the side.<\/p>\n

It took just 18 seconds for Alaves to strike.<\/p>\n

Ilkay Gundogan lost the ball in midfield to Jon Guridi and with Barcelona\u2019s defence in total disarray, he fed Javi Lopez to cross for Omorodion, who slotted through Marc-Andre ter Stegen\u2019s legs.<\/p>\n

Barcelona was easily pulled apart on multiple occasions in the first half, with Alaves target man Omorodion, only 19, bettering Jules Kounde on several occasions.<\/p>\n

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Xavi switched the French centre-back to right-back midway through the first half after the striker barged past Kounde and hit the crossbar.<\/p>\n

Omorodion fired wide one-on-one with Ter Stegen on another occasion, and Alaves could easily have walked in three goals up, but it was just one.<\/p>\n

Lewandowski, 35 and at times in recent weeks looking it, was denied by Alaves goalkeeper Antonio Sivera — the hosts\u2019 only chance of the first period.<\/p>\n

Fans whistled Barca players in at the break, dismayed by another lifeless display. Barcelona reacted, levelling early in the second half.<\/p>\n

Kounde crossed from the right, and Lewandowski arced a brilliant header beyond Sivera\u2019s reach and into the net.<\/p>\n

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Xavi sent on Raphinha, Ferran Torres and Alejandro Balde, hoping their fresh legs would make the difference.<\/p>\n

Yamal, booked for diving earlier on, stung Sivera\u2019s hands with a hard, low strike at the near post, with Barcelona finally playing with fluency.<\/p>\n

Barcelona moved ahead when Torres was clumsily felled in the area by Abdel Abqar, and Lewandowski smashed the penalty into the roof of the net to clinch the points.<\/p>\n

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\nComments\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The victory keeps Barcelona in touching distance of shock leader Girona, four points ahead, and second place Real Madrid, with a two-point advantage, after both won Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":8621,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8620","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football-sport-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baysidesports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8620","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baysidesports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baysidesports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baysidesports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8620"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/baysidesports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8620\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baysidesports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8621"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baysidesports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baysidesports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baysidesports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}