Nerves will have been jangling long before Barcelona travelled to El Sadar, knowing that a win against Osasuna would leave them just one more victory away from securing the league title.
With Real Madrid next up at Camp Nou, there could be no finer way to win LaLiga.
However, even if Los Rojillos had only won two of their last eight league matches (and just one of the last 11 head-to-heads against the Catalans), they were always likely to give Hansi Flick’s side a good game.
Indeed, in 11 of Barca’s last 15 away matches, both teams had scored, and the Blaugranes were also the team to earn the most league points after falling behind (W7, L4).
Let’s take a look at three talking points from the game…
Disjointed and disappointing first half
There was definitely something missing from Barca’s play in the first half.
The final ball was poor, attacks were often laboured and took too long to build, and when a half-chance presented itself, the Blaugranes were too slow to take advantage of it.
As we’ve seen on many occasions already this season, too, the Catalans were susceptible to a fast break, with only Joan Garcia’s excellence and the width of the upright keeping the scores level at the break.
Oh no, Olmo
It wasn’t quite a disaster class from Dani Olmo, however, it was another opportunity missed for the Spaniard, who was rightly hooked on the hour by Hansi Flick.
With Robert Lewandowski toiling, Barca needed Olmo to provide some sharpness and superior movement to help open up the passing lanes.
Aside from one or two moments, he offered little in the way of supplementary attacking presence, and indeed, didn’t manage a shot on target despite often finding himself in some decent positions.
There surely has to be a conversation had this summer now as to his ongoing importance to the team.
Three points all that matter?
Could this actually be considered to be a game where getting the three points was all that mattered?
Where the standard of performance could take a back seat as long as the game was won? Especially without Lamine Yamal and Raphinha.
Culers seemingly always want to be entertained, but with that carrot of winning the title at home against Real Madrid with a victory at El Sadar, there is, perhaps, a school of thought that, for once, putting entertainment in second place is acceptable.
The history books will show Barca winning another title and not how they toiled on Saturday night, so sometimes ‘job done’ can be seen as a positive, right?