Best goalscoring record for half a century

Roger Bogunyà

It is 49 seasons, since that of 1959/60, that any Spanish league team has scored 34 goals in the first ten league matches. Guardiola’s goalscoring machine is making history.

That average of 3.4 goals a game is the best any side has managed in the Spanish championship since Real Madrid’s start to the 1959/60 season. But even so, that Madrid team was still only second in the league table and had conceded three more goals (eleven) than the present day Barcelona, which has only let in eight.

Better record in 1958/59

The previous season, 1958/59, Real Madrid had scored 35 goals in their first ten matches, which was a better record than Barcelona have now. But with football results tending to be much lower in the modern era, mainly due to much more defence minded tactics, it looked highly unlikely that any team would come close to that record ever again.

Barça are also the highest scoring team in any of the major European leagues after ten games.

Unstoppable at home

When we single out just Barcelona’s home games, the results are even more frightening. Three of the last four games at the Camp Nou, against Betis, Atlético Madrid, Almería and Valladolid) have ended with Barça winning by high margins.

But they have scored hatfuls of goals on away trips to Gijón (1-6), Basel (0-5) and Malaga (1-4).

Three in five for Gudjohnsen

One of Barça’s best goalscorers this season has been Eidur Gudjohnsen, who scored the fifth against Valladolid (6-0). He has only played in five games this season, but has scored in three of them, which means he has now scored more goals this season than he managed in all 23 of his appearances last term.