Sports

Barça’s 2-0 win at the weekend in the Catalan derby against Espanyol kept them two points ahead of rivals Real Madrid at the top of the Spanish League table with just five games in the league season remaining. The first of that quintet of title deciders comes on Tuesday against Getafe at Camp Nou, a game that kicks off at 8.00pm CET. The blaugranes cannot afford any slip ups with Carlo Ancelotti’s side breathing down their necks, so victory is imperative at home against the team from Madrid who come into the game in 13th place on 36 points, still needing results to lift them once and for all away from the relegation dogfight at the bottom of the table.

The stage is set and the semi-finals for the 2014/15 UEFA Champions League promises to be one for the ages. Friday's draw in Nyon paired off Barça with Bayern Munich and Juventus with Real Madrid in the final four of Europe's top club competition. The first leg will be played at Camp Nou on 6 May and the second leg will be at Allianz Arena on 12 May. Both games are set for 8.45pm. Luis Enrique's squad will be going up against their ex-coach Pep Guardiola — who led the Catalans from 2008 to 2012 — in a high-profile knockout series that pits two teams with wide-open attacking styles and that should produce a pair of very entertaining football matches, regardless of who comes out on top.

Two first half goals from Neymar were enough to book Barça a spot in Friday’s Champions League semi-final draw, as Luis Enrique’s side denied the French champions any chance of a comeback from last week’s 1-3 win in Paris with a performance that combined champagne moments and cool headed determination. Luis Enrique’s side got a 5-1 aggregate win over PSG.

Barça are just a possible 90 minutes away from a place in the semi-finals of this season’s Champions League. Standing between them and the last four are a PSG side who will have to overcome a 3-1 deficit from the first leg if they are to upset the odds and take their place in Friday’s draw in Nyon, Switzerland. The blaugranes trained on Monday for the final time before the second leg against the French League champions with Iniesta having received the medical all clear. The midfielder is included among 23 players named for the match. Jérémy Mathieu trained on his own in Barça’s final session after picking up a knock against Valencia on Saturday, but he is also included, as are Dani Alves, who missed the win in Paris due to suspension and Thomas Vermaelen, despite not receiving medical clearance.

The game itself was just as heavenly, a thrilling end-to-end affair for all 90 minutes, even if the biggest plays of the day — a first-minute Luis Suárez goal, immediately followed by a saved penalty kick by Claudio Bravo, and a record-breaking 400^th career goal by Leo Messi — came at the very beginning and at the very end. While Valencia put forth a back-breaking effort in between, it wasn’t enough to slow down FC Barcelona, which secured a 2–0 victory at Camp Nou. The win keeps Barça two points clear at the top of the Spanish League table.

Neymar Jr gets the first and Luís Suárez adds two absolute blinders to put Barça on fine course for the Champions League semi-finals. Barça unleashed all their class in the French capital on Tuesday evening to inflict a more than convincing 3-1 defeat on Paris Saint-Germain. In a wonderful performance all round for Luis Enrique’s team it was hard for any single player to stand out, but with two brilliant solo goals, Luis Suárez managed to do just that. Barça will start next week’s second leg at the Camp Nou with a two-goal head start. Things could not be better for a side that will have set legs trembling all around Europe after tonight’s exquisite display n Paris.

The draw for the Champions League quarter-finals brought the blaugranes face to face once again with the current French League champions. The two teams were in the same group earlier in the competition with Barça pipping Laurent Blanc’s team to top spot in Group F. With the Catalans having overcome Manchester City in the last 16 and Paris Saint-Germain having eliminated Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea, the two clubs are now set to battle it out for a place in the Champions League semi-finals. Luis Enrique’s side trained at the Parc des Princes on Tuesday with the Barça coach having brought his entire squad to Paris minus the recovering Thomas Vermaelen and the suspended Dani Alves. Paris Saint-Germain coach Laurent Blanc will have to make do without the former Barça striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

Barça’s two-goal first-half lead evaporates and Sevilla stay unbeaten at home. Tie takes a pair of points from Barça, now up just two in La Liga. FC Barcelona came into the Sánchez Pizjuán in Sevilla on Saturday night with the honourable distinction as the last team to have won there, and they’ll head back home with no change to that status. The Catalans left the field on a sour note after failing to put away their Andalusian rivals despite going up 2–0 in the first half hour, eventually conceding the tying goal to Sevilla’s Kévin Gameiro with eight minutes left to play in a match that stood out for it’s breakneck pace and wild twists and turns that left many of those following it almost as exhausted as the players.

Suárez nets a brace, Messi and Bartra chip in as Barça roll past Andalusians. ??Offensive balance once again as strikers score and a defender delivers. To the casual observer Wednesday night’s La Liga match between FC Barcelona and Almería at Camp Nou was what one might expect as the Catalans thoroughly dominated their opponents in virtually every statistical category on their way winning by a score of 4–0. But to anyone who has been following Barça closely this season, what transpired out on the pitch is likely to be taken as a rock-solid confirmation of how this team got here. Here just happens to be first-place in La Liga, four points clear of Real Madrid with 8 games to play — with a UEFA Champions League quarter-final tie versus Paris Saint-Germain and a Spanish Cup final versus Athletic Club Bilbao waiting in the wings.

A midweek round of league fixtures sees Luis Enrique's team take on the Andalusians who have former blaugrana Sergi Barjuan newly appointed as coach. The blaugranes retained their four point lead at the top of the table over Real Madrid thanks to Jérémy Mathieu’s second half winner on Sunday in the 1-0 win over Celta Vigo at Balaídos. A busy April fixture list means that Barça are back in action on Wednesday as they take on relegation threatened Almería at Camp Nou at 8.00pm CET. The 18 Barça players named for the game are: Ter Stegen, Claudio Bravo, Montoya, Piqué, Rakitic, Xavi, Pedro, Iniesta, Suárez, Messi, Neymar Jr, Rafinha, Mascherano, Bartra, Sergi Roberto, Adriano, Dani Alves and Mathieu.

Mireia Belmonte, Ona Carbonell and Gervasio Deferr. Today’s most famous Catalan athletes all have in common the fact that they started their careers by entering a High Performance Centre and improving their preparation. In Catalonia, many such centres exist and the most famous one is the High Performance Centre at Sant Cugat del Vallès, el CAR, where nearly 1,000 young sports men and women train every day. But the majority of these athletes must take the first step before entering the CAR. This is the main objective of the six Sports Technification Centres that exist today in Catalonia. The ‘Joaquim Blume’ residence is a multidisciplinary centre that apart from making athlete technification easier, also teaches them how to combine their sporting life with an academic education.

The Tour of Catalonia, known as ‘La Volta’, was born in 1911 and is the 3^rd oldest cycling competition in the world, just behind the Tour de France and the Giro d’Italia. Its Director, Rubèn Peris, is proud of the event and says that “‘La Volta’ is something bigger than a race” and is an ambassador for showing Catalonia to the rest of the world, included in the UCI World Tour calendar. From the 23^rd to the 29^th of March, this competition will hold its 95^th edition with the presence of some of the best riders in the world such as Chris Froome, Joaquim ‘Purito’ Rodríguez and Alberto Contador. The CNA interviewed Peris a few days before the start of the race, which "has reached an extremely high level and which is always co-ordinated by amateurs", showing "how strong the associations’ network in Catalonia is".

FC Barcelona have moved four points clear at the top of the Spanish League table after Uruguayan striker Luis Suárez produced a second half wonder-goal to win the Clásico.?Jérémy Mathieu had headed Barça into an early lead before Cristiano Ronaldo equalised for Real Madrid. Sunday night’s Clásico was no disappointment. Both sides served up a veritable footballing feast, and although Real Madrid looked the better side for a large part of the first half, Barça found their A-game after the break and on the back of a fantastic goal from Luis Suárez, marched on to claim three points and take a giant’s step closer to the Liga title.

Jogging has, without a doubt, become a phenomenon in Catalonia. The number of marathon runners doubled from 2008 to 2013 and now stands at 57,000. In 2012, the Barcelona Marathon saw record figures with 16,000 finishers, compared to the 138 that completed the first race in 1978. The rise of running is "something spectacular" and "studies show that 10% of the population are runners and this is certainly going to grow," says Eduardo Grimal, who completed a Master’s in Sports Management. You only have to go one day to the seafront of Barcelona, to the Carretera de les Aigües in Collserola or Montjuïc, stand there for ten minutes and count the number of runners that pass in front of your eyes. But what motivates the runners and is it just a passing fad?

The draw for the Champions League quarter finals has been made, and Barça have been drawn against PSG in a head-to-head battle for a place in the semi-finals of Europe’s premier club competition. The first game will be played in Paris on April 15, and a week later, on April 21, the sides will meet again at the Camp Nou. The two teams, who know each other well from this year's Group F, were the first pair to be drawn. In their group-stage matchups, PSG won the first match in Paris 3–2, but Barça were victorious in the return at Camp Nou, winning 3–1 to top the group, leaving PSG in second. The first match will be without a few big players. Paris Saint-Germain's Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Marco Verratti, and Barça's Dani Alves will all be serving suspensions.