Eibar give it their best shot but come up against a pragmatic & clinical Barça
The Culés ran out 4-0 winners at Ipurua to overcome a brave Eibar effort
SD Eibar slipped to a 4-0 home reverse at the hands of FC Barcelona in a game which saw the Armeros produce a spirited performance, as they dominated proceedings for the opening half hour.
Ultimately, the quality within the Barça squad shone through, with the visitors producing a pragmatic and clinical display to put Eibar to the sword.
Right from the off, the hosts succeeded in satisfying José Luis Mendilibar's aim of seeing his side enjoy as much possession as possible in the opponent's half. The Armeros applied a very high press, which resulted in them regaining possession on numerous occasions in the middle of the park before breaking forwards, although they failed to pose any threat on the visitors' goal.
With 26 minutes on the clock, Marc-André Ter Stegen had to be at his best to deal with an Adrián effort from outside the area.
Eibar were the ones playing all of the football, as Barça looked to capitalise on the slightest gap in the home side's rearguard in their efforts to make the breakthrough. On 31' a blocked effort fell to the feet of Denis Suárez - who had earlier replaced the injured Sergio Busquets - on the edge of the box and his pinpoint drive crept just inside Yoel's right upright.
Five minutes after the restart, Lionel Messi doubled the visitors' advantage when he applied the finishing touch following a fine one-two with Luis Suárez.
Eibar sought to claw their way back into the game and Adrián had the ball in the back of the net on 52', only for the referee to chalk the goal off for offside.
All of Eibar's efforts to shackle their opponents' attacking prowess were proving to be in vain.
In spite of this, the hosts continued to plug away and sought to threaten Ter Stegen's goal. The clearest opening came in the 83rd minute when the Catalans' custodian could only parry a powerful right-footed Pedro León strike from distance, with the rebound falling to Sergi Enrich, who failed to hit the target from an acute angle.
With the 90 minutes up, another counter-attack saw Neymar round off the scoring, slamming the ball home to make it 4-0 to the visitors.
With the season now having reached the halfway stage, Eibar sit comfortably in mid-table in 10th on 26 points, boasting a 13-point cushion on the relegation spots. The Armeros are ever closer to achieving their objective of retaining their league status and they'll now be looking to go on and complete the job, starting next Saturday when Deportivo La Coruña are the visitors to Ipurua.