A head-turning statistic, highlighting the woes of Barcelona star Ronald Araújo across the season to date, has this evening come to the fore online.
As much comes after Araújo was responsible for another high-profile error, during Barcelona’s meeting with Valencia.
Xavi’s troops are of course currently locked in La Liga action with Los Che, in Catalunya’s capital.
After being put to the sword by arch rivals Real Madrid last time out, the Blaugrana’s efforts to get things back on track got off to the perfect start on Monday, Fermín López’s pinpoint header opening the scoring early on.
It wasn’t long, however, before Barca’s evening took a turn for the worse.
First, an utterly needless mistake on the part of Marc-André ter Stegen afforded Valencia a route back into the game through Hugo Duro.
Then, ten minutes later, it was the turn of Ronald Araújo to produce a moment of madness.
Scything down Valencia wide-man Peter in the hosts’ penalty area, the Uruguayan’s recklessness was capitalised on by Pepelu, who put Rubén Baraja’s visitors in front from 12 yards.
This, of course, marks Araújo’s 2nd high-profile error of the last couple of weeks, after the stopper’s red card against Paris Saint-Germain culminated in Barcelona being sent packing from the Champions League.
And as much, as alluded to above, has since given rise to an alarming statistic.
As revealed by Opta:
‘Ronald Araújo has been shown two red cards, conceded two penalties and made two errors leading to goals this season in all competitions, the most of any La Liga player in total.’
Conor Laird | GSFN
