With the recent confirmation from the Spanish La Liga of the first El Clasico being played at Camp Nou on Saturday, October 26th, at 1.00pm CET, it could be one of the most pressured El Clasicos in recent times.

The last time the sides met with a 1.00pm kick off was back in 2017, where Barcelona sealed a 3-0 victory with goals from Luis Suarez, Lionel Messi and Aleix Vidal,which Ernesto Valverdo will be hoping for a repeat of history.

Barcelona have had a shaky start to the 2019/20 season, losing their opening game 1-0 to Athletic Bilbao, whilst also finding themselves on the wrong end of the result against Granada and a draw against Osasuna.

With a draw against Borussia Dortmund in the Champions League, Valverdo already finds himself under pressure, whilst opponent Zinedine Zidane is enjoying life to the start of the La Liga season.

Real Madrid are unbeaten so far in the 2019/20 season, with four victories and two draws as they top the La Liga table with 14 points.

Zidane did find himself under pressure following Real Madrid’s 3-0 Champions League defeat at Paris Saint-Germain, with the Frenchman failing to bring back the fortunes of his triple consecutive European Cup wins from 2015-2018.

However, his recent league success should ease the pressure from the Real Madrid manager, whilst all eyes lie on Valverdo.

Barcelona have opened the season with their worst start in 25 years, with Luiz Suarez recently stating that the year ahead is going to be ‘tough’.

History favours the hosts, with Barcelona claiming four wins in the last five El Classico fixtures, and remaining unbeaten since April 2016.

Real Madrid have claimed just four-wins against the 2018/19 La Liga Champions in the last ten years, and the biggest scoreline in the past decade favours Barcelona 5-0 in 2010, with goals from Xavi, Pedro, David Villa and Jeffren Suarez.

Valverdo will be hoping his team can forget about their dreadful start to the season and turn a corner against Real Madrid and push for their 27th La Liga title.