An amazing clash of the EuroLeague: FC Barcelona – Olympiacos
On Friday evening, the Palau Blaugrana in Barcelona will host the game between FC Barcelona and Olympiacos Piraeus, a game that counts for Round 15 of the 2025-26 EuroLeague season.
After an unconvincing start to the season, Barcelona decided to replace head coach Joan Penarroya with Xavi Pascual, a coach who already knows the club very well, as the Catalan made history with the blaugrana in the previous spell with the club between 2008 and 2016 (he is the last coach that brought Barca a EuroLeague title). Since the coaching change, Barcelona has won 7 of its 8 games in all competitions, and the only defeat was in Istanbul when they lost by one point against Efes. In the EuroLeague, Barca has a 9-5 record, tied with four other teams, while Olympiacos or Fenerbahce could also have the same record as their game was cancelled last week due to weather conditions in Greece. Olympiacos, which is undefeated in the Greek league, would certainly like to reach the 9-5 mark on Friday with a win in Catalunya. It would put them over Barcelona in the standings, and next week they will play both their EuroLeague games at home against Valencia and Lyon, so their upcoming schedule is favourable.
While the two teams have an almost identical record, statistically, Olympiacos is better in most categories. The Reds have a slight advantage in points scored per game, but they are clearly better in rebounds – Olympiacos is the 4th best rebounding team in the league, while Barca is 16th – and in PIR (the Greeks are 2nd, Barcelona is 11th). They also have a slight advantage in assists per game, while Barca is better in steals, three-point percentage, and they commit slightly fewer turnovers. Of course, these numbers can change a lot in the future, given that Xavi Pascual just recently took the head coaching job, and the style of play will be different from before.
The last meeting between the two sides was in February, when the Greek team won a hard-fought game 90-88 at the Palau Blaugrana (Olympiacos had won the last four head-to-head games against Barcelona). It was a showdown between Kevin Punter, who finished that game with 20 points and a PIR of 31 and Sasha Vezenkov, who had 24 points and a PIR of 30. We can expect the same two players to be leaders for their teams this time as well, and just like their last head-to-head game, we can expect a battle with no clear favourite.
Imre Halasz
Image: EuroLeague
