Barca fires five past Sevilla as Gavi returns
Gavi made an emotional return for Barcelona after almost a year out with injury, coming on as a late substitute as Hansi Flick's side thrashed Sevilla 5-1 to stay top of LaLiga ahead of next week's Clasico against Real Madrid.
Sevilla started brightly but Raphina won a penalty in the 24th minute, which Robert Lewandowski put away to get Barca on its way.
Four minutes later, Pedri fired home a delicious strike from the edge of the box to double the hosts' lead and Lewandowski was on hand again to divert a Raphina effort into the back of the net on 39 minutes to make it 3-0 at the break.
Lamine Yamal almost added a fourth straight after the restart with a superb trivela attempt that was clawed away brilliantly by Oryan Nyland in the Sevilla goal.
Raphina was then denied a second when his breakaway effort was ruled out for offside four minutes later, Lamine providing the assist with another exquisite trivela.
Sevilla also fell foul of the assistant referee when it was twice denied opportunities to get back in to the game.
Barcelona's Pablo Torre then set about extending the scoreline, bagging his first on 82 minutes and another two minutes from time, his goals sandwiched by the return of Gavi from the bench after 11 months recovering from an anterior cruciate ligament injury, making it a very successful night for the Blaugrana.
Barcelona has 27 points after this win and is three points clear of Madrid ahead of next week's Clasico, having scored an incredible 33 goals from its 10 matches so far.
Sevilla is in 13th position with 12 points after what was its fourth defeat of the season.
