Cadiz vs Barcelona Prediction: Barca to rotate but still win

Barcelona travel to Cadiz for the Saturday night game (20:00) in La Liga this Saturday, no doubt buoyed by their outstanding result in Paris and also, you have to think there will be quite a bit of rotation involved.

Our Spanish Football expert Mark Sochon is here with his preview in his Cadiz vs Barcelona predictions column for us at Betfred Insights...

Barcelona travel to Cadiz this Saturday in La Liga in a game sandwiched in between the two legs of their Champions League quarter-final against PSG.

Particularly given the Parisians don’t have a domestic fixture this weekend, Xavi is almost obliged to rest players and he’s missing three to suspension in any case. However, he’ll still want to send out an eleven that is capable of winning this fixture with the title race just about alive.

Barca are eight points behind Real Madrid with eight games to play, but they do travel to the Santiago Bernabeu for El Clasico next weekend. Win both fixtures and there’d suddenly be an element of pressure on Los Blancos and the prospect of a much tighter finale to La Liga than many were expecting.

That being said, it does feel like the Champions League is now the undisputed priority for Barcelona who will very seriously be eyeing up a potential trip to Wembley on June 1st having defeated PSG 3-2 in the away first leg of their quarter final on Wednesday night.

In an entertaining game, Barcelona successfully kept Kylian Mbappe quiet and Raphinha was the somewhat unlikely hero for the Catalans. The former Leeds winger has divided opinion amongst Barca fans throughout his time in Spain, but he was inspired in midweek with two cool finishes ensuring Xavi’s team walked away with a fantastic first leg result.

There were further boosts for Barcelona in the form of the return from injury of Frenkie de Jong and Pedri in the fixture with the latter coming off the bench to almost instantly produce a sublime assist for Raphinha’s second goal.

It’s now five straight wins for Barca in all competitions and 12 unbeaten since Xavi announced his intention to step down. Even many of his former critics are now coming around to the idea of him staying for at least another season, with few obvious options to succeed him. That’s a conversation that is likely to run and run over the remainder of the campaign, particularly if Barca go all the way to the Champions League final.

Cadiz form the opposition on Saturday and the visitors can expect few favours from a team that is fighting for their lives at the bottom. The Andalusians have been in the bottom three for most of the season and went more than six months without winning a league game until they stunned Atlético Madrid 2-0 early last month.

They made it back-to-back home wins by beating fellow strugglers Granada 1-0 a fortnight ago and suddenly there is a little bit of hope in their battle against the drop. They are going to need a really strong end to the season if they’re to stand any chance of staying up though and with no away wins to their name, their home games are going to be key.

Former Southampton boss Mauricio Pellegrino is at the helm and they are a team that has some pretty serious limitations, particularly in terms of creativity and attacking threat. They are La Liga’s lowest scorers with just 21 goals in 30 matches, although things have improved slightly in recent weeks, with January signing Juanmi giving them a fresh option up top.

Team News:

Cadiz are tending to go 4-4-2 and they do have striker Maxi Gomez available again after injury, which provides a fresh option for Pellegrino should he wish to go with the Uruguayan rather than Chris Ramos as partner to Juanmi in attack.

The struggling hosts are missing four players to injury though with Jose Mari, Rominigue Kouame, Luis Hernandez and Fede San Emeterio all set to miss this game.

Barcelona have three players suspended, with Robert Lewandowski, João Cancelo and Iñigo Martinez unavailable. Alejandro Balde and Gavi also remain out but otherwise Barcelona are doing much better on the injury front now.

Xavi is widely expected to rotate heavily ahead of the games against PSG and Real Madrid. João Félix, Fermin Lopez, Ferran Torres and Hector Fort are among those who should come into the eleven while Vitor Roque and Marc Guiu are competing to take Lewandowski’s place in attack.

Cadiz vs Barcelona Odds:

Barcelona head into the game as the 5/6 favourites, with Cadiz priced at 100/30 and the Draw on offer at 13/5.

The big question for punters is how much of a negative effect the rotation and the suspensions to Lewandowski and Cancelo will have on this Barca team. If you fancy the hosts to be competitive and get a result, you can back Cadiz or Draw Double Chance at 19/20.

However, Barca will still feel like they have more than enough quality to win the game. Having kept five straight clean sheets in La Liga, they look good at 2/1 to win to nil while you can back Barcelona and Under 3.5 Goals at 7/5.

With no Lewandowski, the standout Barca goalscorer options are perhaps Ferran Torres who is 15/8 to score anytime, while Joao Felix can be backed at 12/5 to score anytime.

Juanmi is the shortest priced Cadiz player in the goalscorer markets at 13/2 to score first and 11/5 to score anytime.

Bet 1 - Barcelona to win @ 5/6

In complete contrast to a few months ago, there is suddenly a feel-good factor around this Barcelona squad and a sense that momentum is building towards a much more positive conclusion to the season than seemed possible.

While there’ll be considerable changes here, whichever eleven Xavi picks, it should still be stronger than a Cadiz side that rarely offers much in the final third. While it’s true that Pellegrino’s team have improved a bit in recent weeks, I can’t see them causing many problems for the visiting defence and I’m going with Barcelona to win at 5/6.

Bet 2 - Highest Scoring Half - Second Half @ 21/20

It feels highly likely that Xavi will leave İlkay Gündoğan, Lamine Yamal and Raphinha on the bench while Frenkie de Jong and Pedri are also unlikely to be risked from the off given their recent injuries.

The Barca boss will still be very keen to win the game though so we could see the visitors really go for it in the final half hour with a lot of quality and fresh legs to bring off the bench. That should see the game open up and a tiring Cadiz may struggle in those circumstances.

I’m backing Highest Scoring Half - Second Half at 21/20 which has been a really profitable bet this season in Barca games in La Liga which have produced a total of 63 Second Half goals compared to only 32 First Half goals.

You can check out Mark's La Liga Betting Tips along with those from the rest of the Betfred Insights Spanish Football writers on our La Liga home page...