Barcelona handles Espanyol, keeps pace with Real Madrid in La Liga title race

Luis Suarez scored two predatory second-half goals to pull Barcelona back level with Real Madrid in a La Liga title race that is looking surer and surer to come down to the wire.

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After a frustrating first half that bore no fruit, Suarez pounced on a calamitous Espanyol back pass to give Barcelona a 1-0 derby lead, and eventually a 3-0 derby victory, over its Catalan rivals.

Suarez’s anticipation and deadly outside-of-the-foot flick equaled Real Madrid’s 2-1 victory over Valencia earlier on Saturday, and lifted Barcelona back into first place. The two Spanish giants are now even on 81 points. Barcelona holds the head-to-head tiebreaker. Madrid, however, has a game in hand — it has four to go, while the reigning champs have only three.

Madrid had shifted the onus in the heavyweight battle at the top of the La Liga table onto Barcelona with Marcelo’s 86th-minute winner. But Barca held serve via Suarez, and ensured a return to the top of the table via Ivan Rakitic. The Croatian midfielder finished off a dazzling Lionel Messi run with a simple left-footed finish to more or less put the game to bed:

The goal was one of the few times all evening that Messi had found space in between Espanyol’s defensive and midfield lines. It wasn’t until the closing stages that the game really became stretched, and when it did, Barcelona got its third, again through Suarez, and again through some good fortune:

Barca was frustrated throughout much of the first half. It took the Messi-Suarez-Neymar trio about 15 minutes to really begin combining in the final third, and even then, space was scarce.

Meanwhile, on the other end, Felipe Caicedo presented Jose Manuel Jurado with a glorious chance for Espanyol. The Ecuadorian striker played a precise square ball to the Spaniard, but Jurado dragged his shot wide of the far post.

Barcelona took control of the game in part because of its counterpress. It pinned Espanyol back by stepping in front of the home team’s passes out of the back, and the sustained Barca possession led to chances, though not quite to goals.

After Suarez’s goal early in the second half, Marc-Andre ter Stegen had one crucial save to make. And he made it, flying to his left to corral Jurado’s left-footed half-volley in the 70th minute.

The game began to open up just a tad as Espanyol pushed for an equalizer, and “just a tad” was all that Barcelona needed. Messi eluded trailing defenders and weighted his pass to Rakitic expertly. Suarez then bagged his second on his second shot of the game, and Barcelona cruised to victory.

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