Weekend Derbies

DATE_FORMAT_LC5 1981

As the top European leagues enter the business end of the season, we have some thrilling derby matches to look forward to this weekend, beginning in Germany.

We travel to the North Rhine-Westphalia region of the country for the Borussen derby between Borussia Dortmund and Borussia Monchengladbach.

The game will be played on the 13th of May at Signal-Iduna-Park and the hosts come into the game in second place in the Bundesliga, 1 point behind the leaders while the visitors are in 10th place and out of European qualifying contention.

Interestingly, Borussia Monchengladbach have had the better of recent games, winning 3 of the last 4 Borussen derbies but they have all be played at Borussia-Park.

When Dortmund have been at home, they have won each of the last 9 games between the teams.

Borussia Dortmund are also in significantly better form than Borussia Monchengladbach and should come out on top in a game that could see plenty of goals.

Next, we head to Scotland as Rangers meet Celtic in the Old Firm derby. Rangers were hoping the Scottish title was still going to be on the line going into this match but it was not to be and Celtic will walk into Ibrox Stadium as the 2022/23 champions.

This is one of the fiercest derby matches, on and off the pitch, in the world and there has been much talk about the Rangers players giving Celtic a guard of honour at the beginning of the match to mark their achievement of winning the league.

That would not go down well with the home fans and the atmosphere is going to be incredible.

In terms of the league, Rangers have the better overall record having achieved 126 wins compared to the 114 wins of Celtic.

Rangers have struggled against Celtic in recent times and have failed to record a victory in their 8 most recent attempts in the league and cup.

Celtic are undefeated in their 2 most recent league games at Ibrox and will be feeling confident of picking up the win.

Finally, we have the Derbi Barceloní between Espanyol and Barcelona. The match will be played on the 14th of May at the RCDE Stadium with Espanyol in the relegation zone and Barcelona sitting clear at the top of the table.

Barcelona have dominated the Derbi Barceloní over the years have won 101 matches in the league compared to the 34 victories of Espanyol.

Even when playing at home, Espanyol have struggled to beat Barcelona in recent times and they have failed to win any of their last 14 meetings at the RCDE Stadium.

However, 4 of the last 6 games have ended in a draw and at this stage of the season, given their position in the relegation zone, a point would be a welcome result for Espanyol.

Barcelona will have other ideas and they know a win will see the title return to the Camp Nou and in doing so, leave their city rivals in big trouble at the bottom.