Barca maintain perfect record with 4-1 win

Neymar scored his first league goal in Spanish football as Barcelona maintained their perfect start to the campaign with a 4-1 win over Real Sociedad at the Camp Nou on Tuesday.

The Brazilian bundled home Alexis Sanchez’s cross after just five minutes following a horrible defensive mix-up between Liassine Cadamuro and Claudio Bravo, and then expertly teed-up Lionel Messi to plant a diving header past Bravo three minutes later.

Sergio Busquets added a third before half-time with a sweet strike from 20 yards to register his first goal of the season as the home side produced their best 45 minutes of the season to date.

Alberto De la Bella reduced the arrears for Real Sociedad midway through the second half, but Messi crossed for Marc Bartra to round off the scoring 14 minutes from time as Barca scored four for the third consecutive game.

Amazingly, the visitors had made the brighter start with Haris Seferovic striking the bar from 20 yards inside two minutes.

However, the game was virtually lost for them just six minutes later.

And things went from bad to worse for Real when captain Xabi Prieto had to be replaced by Imanol Agirretxe with a muscular problem that will make him a serious doubt for their Champions League trip to Bayer Leverkusen next week.

The hosts were in full flow and nearly produced a goal of the season contender as Messi, Xavi, Andres Iniesta and Neymar all combined inside the area before Messi unbelievably failed to connect properly on his left foot to turn Neymar’s cut-back home.

Messi wasn’t having his best night in front of goal as he blasted another glaring opportunity over the bar after accelerating past three defenders at the beginning of the second period.

On Monday, Barca coach Gerardo Martino said Sociedad have “excellent individuals” and also highlighted the contribution of Neymar since the forward’s summer move from Brazil.

“We have a perfect record in the table but we haven’t achieved perfection in our game yet,” added the Argentine.