Barcelona has won the final test for next week’s season’s overture in LaLiga against Villarreal. Coach Ronald Koeman’s team won the practice game with Elche in the Trofeo Joan Gamper on Saturday evening 1-0 by a goal from Antoine Griezmann. Frenkie de Jong played with the Catalans throughout the match; Miralem Pjanic made his unofficial debut as a substitute.

Barcelona started again in a 4-2-3-1 system, with Frenkie de Jong and Sergio Busquets as controllers and Philippe Coutinho, Lionel Messi and Ansu Fati around Griezmann. Koeman’s team started the match excellently, as Griezmann opened the score in the second minute. The Frenchman tapped in at the first post on a signal from Jordi Alba, who in turn was beautifully tucked away from midfield by Messi.

Barcelona had almost nothing to fear from Elche, but did not manage to put the PhD student on a larger backlog either. Messi shot Edgar Badia’s fists from a free kick from a distance, while Coutinho overcame Sergi Roberto and De Jong failed eye to eye with Badia. Elche didn’t manage to take the goal from Barcelona in the first half.

Shortly after the break, Fati was close to 2-0, but the youngster headed wide in promising position. Shortly after, Fati shot wide after a great individual action. Barcelona could have increased the score further in the last half hour through Ousmane Dembélé and Trincão, among others, but Badia limited the damage for Elche with good goalkeeper work. The visitors could even have reached the same level in the absolute final stage, but eighteen-year-old Diego Bri bumped into Neto.