Pep Guardiola will make several changes to the team that beat Mallorca for tomorrow night's Copa del Rey first leg game at Atletico Madrid. Carles Puyol, Rafa Marquez and Alex Hleb are all nursing injuries while Victor Valdés, Xavi Hernandez, Eidur Gudjohnsen and Samuel Eto'o have all been rested and will not travel. Coming into the 16 man squad are Albert Jorquera, Martin Caceres, Gerard Pique, Pedro Rodriguez and Leo Messi.

Atletico's coach Javier Aguirre has announced the team that will start against Barça and the surprise is that dangerman Kun Agüero will start on the bench. There...

The kick off times for the last 16 of the Copa del Rey were announced earlier today. The first game with Atletico Madrid will take place at the Vicente Calderon stadium in Madrid on Tuesday 6th January at 8pm. The return at Camp Nou will be played eight days later on Wednesday 14th January with a kick off time of 10pm.

The draw for the Copa del Rey was made today and Barça have been given a difficult task of playing Atletico Madrid in the last 16. The first game will take place at the Vicente Calderon stadium on January 7th with the return game at Camp Nou on January 14th. The last game between the two clubs ended in a 6-1 home victory for Barça at the start of October.

The draw was also made for the quarter finals and the semi finals. If Barça beat Atletico there is a big chance of a derby match against Espanyol in the quarter finals as Barça will face the winner of Espanyol - Poli Ejido, the first game would be away on January 21st with the return at Camp Nou on 28th January. In a possible semi final we would play whoever...

A late goal from Leo Messi finally saw off a spirited Benidorm who really deserved to take a draw from tonight's game. It's difficult to know why Barça have suffered so much against the likes of Basle and Benidorm when they have beaten much bigger teams such as Atletico Madrid and Almeria so comprehensively. The team seems to work just as hard but perhaps there is a relaxing in the concentration levels that makes the difference. For the Benidorm players as well it is possibly the biggest game of their careers and they raised their game accordingly. 

Benidorm demonstrated after just seventy seconds that they did not see the tie as over sending in a dangerous cross from the right. And as the first half continued it was the team...

As is becoming customary Pep Guardiola will not announce the squad for tomorrow night's 2nd leg Copa del Rey match with Benidorm until the day of the match. However, he gave an indication of his intentions today when no players from Barça Atlètic were included in the first team training session. Guardiola refuses to allow his players to relax and today talked again of the problems of over-confidence and the dangers of falling into the bad habits of the last two seasons. He also said that nobody should treat tomorrow's game as a friendly.

Whatever the case the 0-1 lead from the first leg should never be put in danger against a team from the Second Division B. Guardiola will no doubt give...

A goal in the 55th minute from Bojan Krkic gave Barça a 0-1 win over Benidorm in a boring first leg match in the Copa del Rey. The format of the Copa del Rey unfortunately gives us these tedious games where there really is very little of note to report. We all know that the format of the FA Cup in England produces a much more exciting competition so it really is difficult to understand why things are not changed in Spain. This was one of the rare occasions where I would quite happily have not watched the game but I felt for the sake of my loyal readers I ought to stick with...

Barça's Copa del Rey first leg game at Benidorm has been brought forward a day and will take place on Tuesday 28 October at 9pm local time. Barça will now play three games in the space of seven days, starting on Wednesday with the trip to Switzerland to take on Basle in the Champions League (kick off 8.45pm), followed by the league match on Saturday at home to Almeria and then the trip to Benidorm.

The photo has nothing to do with Benidorm, it is Victor Valdés's fantastic save from Yeste's free kick in yesterday's 0-1 victory over Athletic Bilbao.

The draw for the last 32 of the Copa del Rey was made today and Barça have been paired with Benidorm CD. The first game will be played on October 29th with the return at Camp Nou on November 12th. The date could vary a day either way depending on the TV companies.

Barça last played Benidorm in the 1998/99 Copa del Rey winning 3-0 at home and 0-1 away. Benidorm play in Group III of the Segunda Division B and are currently third from bottom with 6 points from 7 games.

Here is the full draw: 

Poli Ejido - Villarreal
Real Unión - Real Madrid
Benidorm - Barcelona
Orihuela - Atlético
Portugalete - Valencia
Ponferradina - Sevilla
Elche...