Barcelona play the second game on their pre-season tour of Asia this week, as FC Seoul provide the opposition at the Seoul World Cup Stadium.
Hansi Flick’s side were not involved in the Club World Cup, so they are a bit further along in their pre-season preparations than their main domestic rivals Real Madrid and Atletico Madrid. They’ve taken a very strong squad to the South Korean capital for this game, and head to Seoul in good spirits after a 3-1 victory over Vissel Kobe in Japan.
That was their first friendly building up to the new campaign, and no Barca player clocked up the full 90 minutes, with this tour very much about fitness, as well as the obvious desire to generate fresh revenue. The likes of Raphinha, Lamine Yamal, Robert Lewandowski and new signing Marcus Rashford all featured in Kobe, but the goals came from less expected sources, with Eric Garcia, Roony Bardghji and Pedro Fernandez Sarmiento on target.
FC Seoul should have the edge in terms of fitness here, given they are right in the middle of their season. They currently sit fourth in the K League, although they are 18 points shy of runaway leaders Jeonbuk. The Dark Red Warriors were in league action on Sunday, defeating Daejeon Hana Citizen 1-0 thanks to a penalty from former England international Jesse Lingard.
How the bookies view it: Barca the red-hot favourites
Barcelona start the game as the 2/11 favourites according to Boylesports. If you see the hosts being capable of springing a surprise, you can back FC Seoul to win at 13/2, while the draw is priced at 9/2.
Recent head-to-head: Clubs set for first meeting
These clubs have not previously met, but Barcelona have played friendlies in Korea before. Pep Guardiola’s side defeated a K-League All Stars lineup 5-2 in 2010, while they lost 1-0 to Suwon Samsung in a friendly in this city back in 2004.
Players to watch: Wingers to star in Seoul?
With Rashford unlikely to be fit enough to start following the hamstring injury that hampered the end of his time at Aston Villa, Barca are likely to again go with their star wingers Raphinha and Lamine Yamal in this game. Between them, they registered 27 goals and 22 assists in La Liga last term, as well as 29 goal contributions in the Champions League.
Predicted Lineups
The hosts are likely to name a strong lineup, but they are missing Tae-wook Jeong due to injury.
Flick may make light changes to the side that started against Vissel Kobe. He’s without the injured Marc-Andre ter Stegen, while the game will also come too soon for young midfielder Marc Bernal.
FC Seoul: Kang, Kim Jin-su, Kim Ju-sung, Al-Arab, Park, Rodrigues, Hwang, Jeong, Oliveira, Lingard, Cho.
Barcelona: J. Garcia, Balde, Cubarsi, Araujo, Kounde, Pedri, Casado, Olmo, Raphinha, Lewandowski, Yamal.
Anything else catch the eye?
Under Flick, Barcelona always take risks and they usually leave some gaps at the back, so Seoul will fancy their chances of at least replicating Vissel Kobe who managed to get on the scoresheet against the Spanish champions at the weekend.
However, Barca have a really strong squad with them, with a wide range of attacking options for Flick to call upon when he inevitably makes changes after the interval. Given that, backing Barcelona and both teams to score looks good at 6/5 with Boylesports, while you can back Barca to win by two goals again at 10/3 with Bet365.
You can also get odds of 7/10 for over 3.5 goals, a winning bet in eight of the last 12 Barca games.
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