One of the main reasons for Barcelona’s recent success in El Clásico against Real Madrid has been Xavi Hernández’s decision to play Ronald Araujo at right-back to match up against one of Madrid’s danger man, Brazilian winger Vinicius Junior.
Araujo has had overwhelming success against Vinicius over the course of their many individual battles, and it’s been a big part of why Los Blancos struggle to consistently create dangerous attacks against Barça even in the games they have won in the last two years.
So it’s only natural to expect Xavi to revert back to the same formula when the two rivals meet on Sunday in the Spanish Super Cup Final in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.