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Barcelona 1-2 Real Madrid: Five Talking Points

10-man Real Madrid came from behind to beat Barcelona 2-1 thanks to goals from Karim Benzema and Cristiano Ronaldo and cut their lead at the top of La Liga to six points. Gerard Pique scored from the corner to give Barcelona the lead just before the hour mark.

That goal was largely against the run of play and Marcelo’s lung-bursting run right through the heart of the Barcelona defence helped Toni Kroos set up Benzema for the equaliser. Just as the visitors started to pile on the pressure, Sergio Ramos was sent-off with six minutes to go.

Yet, barely a minute later, Ronaldo calmed brought down Gareth Bale’s cross and scored the winner to end Barcelona’s 39-game unbeaten run and bring Real Madrid to within seven points of the La Liga leaders with seven games to go.

Here are the major talking points from the game

A game of two halves

It was a captivating game of two contrasting styles

Barcelona came into the game on a 39-game unbeaten run, this was Zinedine Zidane’s first El Clásico and the Blaugrana were 10 points ahead of Real and were running away with the league. Although this was the most anticipated match of the year, one still had the feeling this might not be much of a contest on current form, but that couldn’t have been farther from the truth.

Although the first half was the hosts dominating the contest without creating too many clear-cut chances, the visitors ended the half strongly, even if the half on the whole was high on action but low on quality with Sergio Ramos being an extremely lucky man.

While it was Barcelona who took the lead in the second half, it was against the run of play as it was Real Madrid, who dominated the contest. They were even unlucky to have a perfectly legitimate goal ruled off for a foul but Ronaldo’s winner gave them a deserved win in the end. Those predicting an easy win for the hosts were left with some egg on their faces as Real Madrid outplayed them and were worthy winners of a game of two different halves.

As they, all good things have to come to an end and as glorious as the Blaugrana’s unbeaten run was, it is finally over and they are now just six points ahead of Atletico, who are in second place, in La Liga and have a crucial UEFA Champions League quarter-final just around the corner.

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