Real Madrid and Barcelona face each other again, now in the Copa del Rey Semifinals

BARCELONA — Real Madrid and Barcelona will meet in one of the semifinals of the Copa del Rey, whose draw, held this Monday in Madrid, paired Osasuna with Athletic Club in the other tie. The Bernabéu will open the Clásico cupbearer the first week of March, on the 1st or 2nd, and the second leg, on April 4th or 5th, will be held at the Camp Nou.

It will be the 36th cup match between the two greats, the first since the 2019 semifinal in which Barça qualified for the final (which they would lose against Valencia in Seville) and whose first duel dates back to the same penultimate tie that faced them in 1916 , being on that occasion the merengue team the one that went to the final, which would lose to Athletic Bilbao.

The tie between the two greats will come two months after their confrontation in the Super Cup final that Barça beat in Saudi Arabia (1-3) and will be played with the League Classic in between, which the Camp Nou will host on March 19 , so both teams will have met five times this season.

If for the Barça team it represents the opportunity to play the final again after two years (when they beat Athletic in 2021), for the Madrid team it is the opportunity to play their first final of the tournament since 2014, when they precisely won their last trophy beating Barça himself at Mestalla 2-1.

HISTORY

Since the 1916 semifinal (which was decided after two tiebreakers) there have been 35 games played by the two greats, Barça having won 15 games to Madrid’s 12 and the remaining 8 ending in a draw.

Beyond the seven finals that they played between 1936 and 2014, with four victories for Meringues and three for Barça, the two teams have met in 13 ties, of which Barça won seven and Madrid six.