Barcelona sweating on fitness of second defender for El Clasico after missing second training

Barcelona are facing late concerns that one of their key defenders may not be fit for El Clasico on Sunday, as they travel to face top of the table Real Madrid. Jules Kounde has now missed their last two training sessions due to a muscular problem.

On Thursday, alarm bells rang in Can Barca due to the absence of both Frenkie de Jong and Andreas Christensen due to illness. The Danish defender was missing his third day in a row of training due to the same issue. However Sport say that de Jong at least is training as of Friday, and has recovered from his issue – there is no update on Christensen.

Jules Kounde misses second consecutive training session

The perhaps more concerning case for Barcelona is Kounde at this point. His absence from training did not make headlines on Thursday, but the Frenchman missed the session with muscle discomfort, and on Friday was absent again for Barcelona. It leaves just one final training session for Kounde to prove he is fit for the big match on Friday.