Madrid,
\nBarcelona coach Ernesto Valverde was delighted that his side \u201cfinally\u201d wrapped up a 25th La Liga title with four matches to spare, after a Lionel Messi hat-trick secured a thrilling 4-2 victory at Deportivo La Coruna.<\/p>\n
Valverde\u2019s men completed a league and cup double after thrashing Sevilla 5-0 in last week\u2019s Copa del Rey final, regaining the Spanish crown from Real Madrid and relegating Deportivo in the process.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you chase it for so long you say \u2018finally\u2019,\u201d he told Spanish television. \u201cI feel very happy because in the end the league is very long, it starts in August… and when spring arrives everything is decided, we have passed everything. We\u2019ve been pursuing it since the beginning, we have been in the lead, we\u2019ve finished well, with a big margin… It\u2019s the first La Liga that I\u2019ve won.\u201d<\/p>\n
The only blip on the Catalans\u2019 season was the stunning Champions League quarterfinal loss at Roma when they blew a 4-1 first-leg lead. \u201cThe elimination (by Roma) marked us a little bit because it was unexpected, but out trajectory has been extraordinary,\u201d added Valverde. \u201cThere is always a small \u2018but\u2019, but we\u2019ll try again next year.\u201d<\/p>\n
Barca knew they just had to extend their record unbeaten streak to 41 La Liga matches to seal a seventh title in 10 seasons, and Philippe Coutinho fired them into an early lead. Messi\u2019s 38th-minute volley made it two, but Lucas Perez pulled one back for Deportivo before half-time and Turkish winger Emre Colak stunned Barca with an equaliser midway through the second period.<\/p>\n
Barca finally saw off their stubborn hosts, though, as Messi pounced after a brilliant one-two with Luis Suarez before slotting in to complete his 30th La Liga treble. The Catalan giants now hold an unassailable 11-point lead over second-placed Atletico Madrid, who have just three games to play.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Madrid, Barcelona coach Ernesto Valverde was delighted that his side \u201cfinally\u201d wrapped up a 25th La Liga title with four matches to spare, after a Lionel Messi hat-trick secured a thrilling 4-2 victory at Deportivo La Coruna. Valverde\u2019s men completed a league and cup double after thrashing Sevilla 5-0 in last week\u2019s Copa del Rey […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29781,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[122],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29780","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29780","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29780"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29780\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29782,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29780\/revisions\/29782"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29781"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29780"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29780"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29780"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}