SPORT: Football
Carlo Ancelotti accepts responsibility for Barcelona’s Clasico thrashing.

The Cata­lans picked up a 4–0 Cla­si­co win at the Bern­abeu on Sun­day.
For­mer Arse­nal cap­tain Pierre-Emer­ick Aubameyang scored twice as Barcelona went wild in the capital.

And fur­ther goals from Ronald Arau­jo and Fer­ran Tor­res sealed Real’s dis­as­trous result in front of a dis­grun­tled home crowd.

The La Liga lead­ers are still 12 points clear of their fierce rivals in the title race.

But ques­tions will cer­tain­ly be asked of Ancelot­ti, who also came under heavy fire when Real looked like they were close to leav­ing PSG in the Cham­pi­ons League before Karim Ben­ze­ma inspired a mirac­u­lous late comeback.

The tal­is­man­ic French strik­er missed last night’s defeat through injury.
And his absence was felt as Real’s bizarre dia­mond for­ma­tion failed to do the trick, with Ancelot­ti’s half-time adjust­ment to a three-back hinge mak­ing things right. even worse.

The Ital­ian boss now insists he should take respon­si­bil­i­ty for the heavy loss.

But he urged every­one at the club to ‘stay calm’ despite being total­ly out­classed by Xavi Her­nan­dez’s resur­gent Bar­ca side.

Ancelot­ti said: “We start­ed with a one-on-one at the back, but it was­n’t the night for that.

“I’m sor­ry for the fans but we have to look forward.

“I tried to push high­er up the pitch and it did­n’t work. It’s my fault.

“It’s dif­fi­cult because it’s a Cla­si­co loss and los­ing to Barcelona hurts.

“We have to stay calm and recov­er our injured players.

“We’re sor­ry, but we don’t have to make a dra­ma. Every­thing went wrong and I told the play­ers it was my fault.

“It’s a very hard blow to lose this way. We know we have a good lead at the top of the table.

“We can’t make dra­ma out of this game — we have to move on.”