Hansi Flick should really start €45 million-rated Barcelona star against RCD Espanyol — Opinion | OneFootball

FC Barcelona are set to return to La Liga action after a short break. They have been on a brilliant run in the league, including a 2-0 win over Villarreal just before the Christmas break, and now face one of their most difficult fixtures of the season.

A trip away to Espanyol is not going to be a walk in the park, and tensions are even higher this time because of the Joan Garcia factor. Surely the Catalan rivals are not going to be too pleased with Barcelona poaching the best player from their squad.

Hansi Flick will be keen to get his starting line-up spot on on the night, to beat Espanyol and continue their stranglehold on the La Liga table. With this in mind, we at Sempre Barca believe that the German manager should really start Frenkie de Jong against Espanyol.

Photo by George Wood/Getty Images

The Dutch midfield star started the game against Villarreal before the Christmas break in the absence of Pedri and had an unbelievable second half against the Yellow Submarine.

However, with Pedri returning from injury for this game, Flick might be tempted to go back to his tried-and-tested combination of the Canary Islands midfielder and Eric Garcia in midfield, which would mean Frenkie has to warm the bench again.

Against Espanyol, however, Barcelona are expected to dominate possession and proceedings, and the best way to go on the night might be to line up in a classic 4-3-3 with Eric, Pedri, and Frenkie manning the midfield. This would give Flick much more control in the game.

Derbies like the Catalan derby are usually very hotly contested, and the temptation to get sucked into an end-to-end game lies right there. It is important for Barcelona to show who is boss and try to take charge of the narrative from minute one, despite it being an away game.

Frenkie’s profile helps massively in this regard. The €45 million-rated Dutch midfield star brings a semblance of control amid the chaos and is an expert at knowing when to play the ball forward and when to retain it. With Pedri and Eric deeper, he can also act as a box-to-box midfielder and get further forward than he usually does.

From a sporting perspective, Espanyol do not have the toolkit to match Barcelona’s quality on the ball, but they are in very good form, and derbies tend to bring out more in teams regardless of their quality on paper.

After all that happened last summer with the Joan Garcia saga, a win tonight is very important for Hansi Flick and Barcelona. It would also be a great starting point for 2026, and let us see if Barcelona manage to wrest the bragging rights their way tonight.