Barcelona travel to Bilbao this evening hoping to be the first team to beat Athletic Bilbao at their new, San Mames stadium.

Barcelona haven't enjoyed much success in Bilbao recently and have drew their last two league games at the old stadium so they will be hoping for a change of luck.

Once again Barcelona have a long list of absentees and will have to do without Victor Valdes, Carlos Puyol, Jordi Alba, Dani Alves, Leo Messi and Cristian Tello.  They do have a big squad but there's not many teams who could put out a six a side lineup with as much quality as that and Barcelona have to try to find a way to win without them.

Barcelona suffered their first defeat under Tata Martino during the week when they fell 2-1 to Ajax but they didn't seem to be particularly worried and when they were playing against ten men they began taking key players off and replacing them with youngsters.  Perhaps they felt they can pick up the point required to win the group in the home game against Celtic.

Athletic Bilbao will be coming into the game full of confidence after an impressive start to the season which could see them go 4th with a win.  

Bilbao are a club with a great history.  They have won La Liga eight times and the Copa del Rey twenty-three times but they haven't won anything since a double in the 1983/84 season.  In the modern generation were teams scouting networks stretch world wide, Bilbao are hampered due to their policy of only playing Basque born players.  It is an admirable policy and every fan of every club loves nothing more than seeing a locally produced player prosper but when your rivals are full of international players from all over the world it makes a difficult job even tougher.  

If Bilbao are to be successful they will need their key players to perform well.  The in form players this season are the veteran defender Carlos Gurpegi, Markel Susaeta and the excellent young prospects, Aymeric Laporte and Iker Muniain.  Manchester United target Ander Herrera is another player who can make the difference and if they are to enjoy success against Barcelona.

Barcelona will be favourites to pick up the victory but we saw during the week that they are not unbeatable and BIlbao have the talent to cause them problems.  As usual the first goal will be important as Barcelona are a very difficult team to play against when they get themselves in front.  If Bilbao can nick the first goal, Barcelona could have a tough night as they have lacked a Plan B in recent years other than putting Pique up front and hope for the best.