Barcelona vs Atletico Madrid: Joao Felix's goal and Inaki Pena's heroics earn three crucial points for Barcelona

Barcelona had to win the game especially after league leaders Girona and Real Madrid had both won on Saturday. A fabulous, dominant display in the first half was capped by João Félix putting away the only goal of the game, but too many other chances went begging. Atletico Madrid came close in many occasions but Inaki Pena's heroics helped Barcelona earn three crucial points.

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Barcelona created chance after chance right from the beginning. Barca had very good chances too, and could easily have been three goals up inside the first quarter of an hour. Atlético couldn't get anything going at all. There could be no arguing that Barca thoroughly deserved the goal when it finally came.

Joao Felix scored in his second game in a row and Barcelona got the lead in the 28th minute of the match. Raphinha supplied the ball and Joao Felix beat Nahuel Molina with ease before popping a neat finish past Jan Oblak.

Even after scoring, Barcelona continued to dominate. While Barça had been brilliant, it was also hard to comprehend why Atlético had been so uncharacteristically stale. Barcelona could have regret their waste of opportunities but Atletico never played the match seriously. They did create some chances but those were denied by Inaki Pena.

The slender lead started to look more and more wobbly as Atletico gradually started showing more and more of what they could do. The best of the visiting chances was a quite brilliantly struck free kick from former Barca man Memphis, kept out by an even greater save from stand-in keeper Inaki Pena.

FC Barcelona are back to within four points of the leaders, one of whom, Girona, they will be facing next weekend. Barcelona now have 34 points, while Atletico have 31 points in fourth, as well as a game in hand.