The Athletic FC

Welcome to the Athletic FC podcast with me, Ayur Akimu L'Aki-Lare.

El Classico was back to its fiery best on Sunday

as Lamin Yamal's pre-match comments sparked Fury in Madrid.

Did he reignite this fixture? Here with us for this one, we have Paul Ballouz.

We've also got Andy Mitten as well. Right, Paul, VAR decisions, disallowed goals, penalty safe,

cards are plenty, heated scenes at full time. It ended 2-1 to Madrid, who were now five

points clear of Barcelona.

Was this just a little reminder that there's still plenty of fury and spice left in this famous fixture?

I think that there's always been, to be honest, but whenever we see this sort of stuff happening in a game,

it's just, yeah, reminders of why Barsa and

Val-Madrid feel different. I honestly think that both teams, none of them were at their best

in pure football terms. I don't think that Real Madrid is a finished product. They are

very far from that. And I think that Barsson are struggling a lot with physicality, with

injuries, with the individuals that they have available,

and that played a huge part on the version that they could show up in the Bernabel,

but despite like all the football elements that I'm mentioning here,

apart from that, everything was pure classical.

Just a big talk before the game, the atmosphere in the game,

and what happened after it, which I think it's going to keep building up

through a big rivalry through this season. Yeah, you were there, Andy. What was the atmosphere like?

Was it intense? I think it's the biggest game in world football and partly because of the status

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