Barcelona will be aiming to advance to the last-16 stage of the Copa del Rey when they head to Andalusia on Wednesday evening to take on third-tier side Linares Deportivo.
The visitors are the holders of the competition, having beaten Athletic Bilbao in last season's final, while they are the most successful team in the history of the tournament, lifting the trophy on 31 occasions.
Match preview
Linares Deportivo, who operate in the third tier of Spanish football, were only founded in 2009 and have never operated at the top level, most recently playing in the fourth and third tiers.
The Little Blues had only previously managed to reach the second round of the Copa del Rey in their previous three participations in the tournament, so this campaign already represents their best ever performance.
Indeed, Alberto Gonzalez's side beat Gimnastic Tarragona on penalties in the first round before recording a famous 2-1 victory over La Liga outfit Alaves in the second round in the middle of December.
Linares Deportivo also recorded a 4-0 victory over Sevilla's second team in their last league contest, which left them in 14th position in their domestic table, boasting 22 points from their opening 17 matches.
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Barcelona, meanwhile, will enter Wednesday's contest off the back of a 1-0 win over Mallorca in La Liga, with the Catalan giants managing to triumph despite their lengthy absentee list.
Indeed, Xavi's side were missing a number of first-team players through a mixture of injury and coronavirus but secured a huge result on Sunday to rise into fifth position in the table, just one point behind fourth-placed Atletico Madrid on the same number of games (19).
Barcelona, as mentioned, are the most successful team in the history of the Copa del Rey, lifting the trophy on 31 occasions, including last season, when they beat Athletic Bilbao 4-0 in the final.
Xavi's team are 15 points behind league leaders Real Madrid, so a title challenge is incredibly unlikely, while the club failed to qualify for the last-16 stage of the Champions League, meaning that the Copa del Rey might be their best chance of securing major silverware this term, although the Europa League is also an option.
Barcelona have been victorious in five of their last six Copa del Rey fixtures, but they have only won one of their last four away matches and will once again be missing a number of first-team players here.
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Team News
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Linares Deportivo's side is expected to be similar to the one that started against Alaves in the second round of the competition, with a 4-4-2 formation including Hugo Diaz in the final third.
Fran Carnicer and Rodri are again in line for spots in midfield, but head coach Gonzalez has plenty of options for change in the attacking areas, with Cristian Carracedo and Nando Copete competing for starting roles.
Barcelona, meanwhile, will again be without the services of Memphis Depay, Sergi Roberto, Pedri, Ansu Fati and Martin Braithwaite through injury, but Sergio Busquets is back, having served a suspension.
The visitors will also be without Philippe Coutinho, Abde Ezzalzouli, Gavi, Alejandro Balde and Sergino Dest following recent positive coronavirus tests, but Ousmane Dembele and Jordi Alba are back in the squad.
Samuel Umtiti and Clement Lenglet were both on the bench at the weekend despite recently testing positive for the virus, but the pair are unavailable here through illness.
Luuk de Jong scored the winner against Mallorca but misses out against Deportivo through suspension, so the returning Ousmane Dembele could start alongside Ilias Akhomach and Ferran Jutgla in attack, while Dani Alves is in line to make his second debut for the club.
Linares Deportivo possible starting lineup:
Brimah; Perejon, Lara, Gomez, Barbosa; Sanchidrian, Alex, Rodri, Carnicer; Diaz, Etxaniz
Barcelona possible starting lineup:
Neto; Alves, Mingueza, Garcia, Araujo; Nico, F de Jong, Puig; Akhomach, Jutgla, Dembele
We say: Linares Deportivo 0-2 Barcelona
Upsets can occur in the Copa del Rey, but we are finding it very difficult to predict one in this match; Barcelona will again be missing a number of key players, but the Catalan giants should have more than enough quality to comfortably progress to the last-16 stage of the competition once again.
Top tip
Data Analysis
Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats up until an hour before kickoff, suggested the most likely outcome of this match was a Barcelona win with a probability of 61.76%. A draw had a probability of 22.2% and a win for Linares Deportivo had a probability of 16.01%.
The most likely scoreline for a Barcelona win was 0-1 with a probability of 12.97%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 0-2 (11.94%) and 1-2 (9.69%). The likeliest drawn scoreline was 1-1 (10.52%), while for a Linares Deportivo win it was 1-0 (5.72%). The actual scoreline of 1-2 was predicted with a 9.7% likelihood. Our team at Sports Mole and our data analysis both correctly predicted that Barcelona would win this match.
