Barça's nine straight wins are great, but Mourinho's Clásico is the real exam

Is a perfect start proof of a great team, or just proof that nobody has made it uncomfortable yet? On Sunday, October 25, at 21:00 local time in Spain, Barcelona get their answer, and the man holding the question is José Mourinho.

Here is the setup. As Goal reports, Hansi Flick's side matched the best start LaLiga has seen, nine wins from nine, after beating Real Betis 5-2. That equals the Real Madrid class of 1968-69. Barça have scored 39 goals in those nine games. Beating Madrid at the Camp Nou would make it 10 from 10, a mark that would stand alone.

Madrid arrive with their own business. Mourinho's team beat Leipzig 4-1 in the Champions League midweek, and he used the postgame to complain that his players will have 24 hours less rest than Barcelona's, as El Confidencial notes.

The streak is real, but it is the wrong thing to be impressed by

Nine wins is a headline. Thirteen different scorers is the story. Goal points out that this team does not lean on one man, and we think that matters more than the record itself. Streaks can be built on finishing luck and soft fixtures. A scoring load spread this widely points to a structure that produces chances in several ways.

Still, we should be honest about what the numbers can't tell us. The nine matches include a Betis game that ended 5-2, which is a lot of goals for the other side to score too. Sports Mole noted earlier in October that Barça had conceded seven in their first seven league games. A team that scores 4.33 a game can win while defending loosely. Against most opponents, nobody punishes that. Against a Mourinho side, we suspect somebody will try.

Mourinho's trademark is to make the other team uncomfortable

Mourinho is not a coach who chases a game's tempo. In our view, he tends to dictate it, and his own words hint at that: he said his team played the first half against Leipzig "at a low rhythm" and that "when we intensify the rhythm, it's another story." That reads like a coach who believes he has a gear to shift when he needs it.

That is the test. Momentum carries a team when games flow its way. A system holds when the game turns scrappy, when the opponent sits back, when a rival strikes on the break. If Barça's output depends on rhythm and confidence, a tight, ugly first hour will expose it. If it depends on patterns that work whatever the scoreboard says, they will keep finding the openings their rivals have failed to close.

We lean toward system. Flick has won six of his last seven meetings with Madrid, according to Aerobús Barcelona's match preview, and last season's league title was sealed with a 2-0 win over them at the Camp Nou. That record belongs to the coach, not to the current run. This is also the first time Flick and Mourinho have met, so history only goes so far.

Why Madrid are a bigger threat than their form suggests

Madrid are not the same side Flick has been beating. They started the season with three straight wins, and Mourinho's return to the Clásico is, we expect, the kind of game he will prepare for obsessively. The 24-hour rest complaint is, in our view, partly gamesmanship and partly a real problem: both teams played Champions League matches this week, and Madrid face a trip to Athens and a Valencia game two days apart soon after. The Clásico is a rare moment when he can ask players to give everything.

Mourinho also said there is no confidence going into a Clásico, and that calling it just another match is "to lie." We read that as pressure transfer. The pressure sits with the team that has a record to lose.

Our verdict

Barcelona should be favorites at home, and we would not bet against them. But the interesting scenario isn't a win or a loss. It's how they get it. A win in which Madrid are forced to defend deep and Barça still create from several angles would tell us this is a system. A win built on one hot half, or a draw where the machine stalls, would tell us the streak owed a lot to the schedule.

Our advice: don't judge Barcelona by the 10th win. Judge them by what they do in the stretches when Mourinho has taken away the easy options.