Stuttgart confirmed as third preseason friendly
A new preseason friendly has been confirmed. Following back-to-back games at the Estadi Johan Cruyff against Tarragona (July 21 at 7.00pm CEST) and Girona (July 24 at the same time), Barça will be heading to Germany for their third game.
Ronald Koeman and his side will be playing in Stuttgart on July 31 at 6.00pm CEST, against the side that finished ninth in the Bundesliga last season. Like all the preseason friendlies this year, the game will be screened worldwide on Barça TV+.
The game will be part of a training camp being scheduled for Baden-Württemberg (Germany), where the team will be based from July 28 to August 2.
First meeting since 2010
Meetings between Barça and Stuttgart are something of a rarity, and this is the first since they crossed paths in the round of 16 of the 2009/10 Champions League. The sides drew 1-1 in Germany, with Zlatan Ibrahimovic scoring Barça’s solitary goal, but Pep Guardiola commanded the side to 4-0 victory in the return at Camp Nou, the goals coming from Messi (2), Pedro and Bojan.
They also met in the group stage in 2007/08, Barça winning 2-0 away and 3-1 at home in what were the first ever competitive meetings between the sides.
But they had met before in a friendly at Les Corts way back in 1954. The testimonial match for Manuel Torres ended in a 3-1 win for the blaugrana.
So, five previous encounters have produced four wins for the Catalans and one draw.
25 friendlies in Germany
This will be the 26th time that Barça have played a friendly in Germany, the series dating back to 1956 when they won 4-3 at Kickers Offenbach.
Since then, Barça have visited the likes of Hamburg, Hannover, Cologne and Bayer Leverkusen, while the most recent example was a trip to Bayern Munich in 2013, that the home side won 2-0.
Overall Barça have won 12, drawn 4 and lost 9 of their friendlies in the country.
