El Clasico ICC 2017: Real Madrid 2-3 Barcelona - 5 Talking Points
Barcelona were crowned the International Champions Cup 2017 champions after they recorded a 3-2 win over arch-rivals Real Madrid in new manager Ernesto Valverde's first ever El Clasico.
Lionel Messi opened the scoring within the first 3 minutes, with Ivan Rakitic adding to the tally only 4 minutes later. The Camp Nou outfit could have added a couple more to their tally if not for some poor finishing by Messi and Neymar.
Real Madrid pulled one back through Mateo Kovacic, while Marco Asensio equalised soon after to see the two sides remain level at the break. Gerard Pique scored almost immediately after the restart and despite the best efforts of the Santiago Bernabeu outfit, they could not come up with another equaliser.
Here are the biggest talking points from the first El Clasico of the season:
#1 Real Madrid's new arrivals need time to settle
Real Madrid have shunned their quest to sign the biggest names in the world of football and have opted for a more intelligent approach to transfers under Zinedine Zidane.
Los Blancos have stopped spending insane amounts of money on some of the biggest superstars, who more often than not, didn't help with the team balance and ended up leaving the team exposed in key areas. Instead, the Santiago Bernabeu outfit now recruit the players, they need to address the key concerns in their squad.
To this effect, Madrid have so far signed Dani Ceballos and Theo Hernandez from Real Betis and Atletico Madrid respectively, while a couple of other players have joined the squad after their loan spells ended. Almost all the new arrivals played some role in the loss to Barcelona but there is nothing to worry about, not yet.
Ceballos, Borja Mayoral, Jesus Vallejo and Marcos Llorente were all part of Spain's UEFA European Under-21 Championship side which lost to France in the final and as such didn't have sufficient time to join pre-season in time and bond with their new team members.
While the quality is definitely there, it will take time for the new arrivals to find their footing in the star-studded squad and as such it will be in the best interest of the club if they do not read too much into the pre-season performance of the team.