IN SPORT.ES
Barcelona took another step towards the title, although this was slower and shakier than the first, against Mallorca.
Leganes made the early stages uncomfortable for Barcelona, with Miguel Guerrero’s effort cleared off the line by Clement Lenglet.
The striker had another effort which scraped Marc-Andre ter Stegen’s far post.
Barcelona struggled to break down the visitors’ cramped defence, creating nothing of note in the first half hour before the water break.
Quique Setien had chopped and changed his side, bringing in Arthur and Ivan Rakitic in midfield, but Barca seemed less fresh than against Mallorca.
Ansu Fati joined the attack in place of Martin Brathwaite, and it was the youngster who opened the scoring, three minutes before the interval.
Junior Firpo worked hard to win the ball back and squared it for the winger, who drilled home from the edge of the box, a fine effort out of the blue.
In the second half Leganes had to ease up a little at the back and that helped Barca.
Antoine Griezmann slotted home from Nelson Semedo’s cut-back but the Portuguese was fractionally offside and the goal was disallowed.
The second followed shortly after anyway, with Lionel Messi going down in the box in a Leganes sandwich.
It didn’t look a stonewall penalty, but the run from the centre circle by Messi was worthy of reward.
The Argentine dispatched coolly into the side netting and that sealed the win.
Substitute Riqui Puig could have put the icing on the cake but fired too close to Cuellar when Arturo Vidal played him in.
Another game down, and Sevilla away approaching on the horizon already.