Laliga returns on Friday, with Girona and Rayo Vallecano kicking up the new campaign.
Barcelona goes into the season as reigning champions – indeed, they won both Laliga and the Copa del Rey in the last term, while they also triomfligged the Espana in the supercopa.
It was a brilliant debut season that was in charge for Hansi Flick, and one that two of his star attackers – Raphinha and Lamine Yamal – saw themselves, right in Ballon d’Or.
Although Barca will build on the success of last season, it is the start of a new era for Real Madrid under the supervision of Xabi Alonso.
Atletico Madrid completed the traditional “Big Three” last season, and this summer they are busy rebuilding Diego Simeone’s Simeone.
Athletic Bilbao, who finished fourth to secure a place in the Champions League for the first time since 2014-15, has made a declaration of intent by retaining Star Winger Nico Williams, while Villarreal also dinner back at the top table in Europe.
Under the newly promoted clubs, Real Oviedo returns to the top flight after 24 years – the Santi Cazorla team starts their campaign in Villarreal, before she organizes Madrid back in their second outing in the great time.
Here, with the help of data-guided simulations from Opta’s supercomputer, we predict how the LaLala season 2025-26 will shake up.
Barcelona supported Liga title
Barca finished only four points from the second place Madrid last season, but they were the best team in Spain in the campaign at some distance.
The Blaugrana plundered 102 goals in Lalala-Zij were the only team in Europe’s top five divisions to score a century of competition goals in 2024-25, while also led the way for expected goals (92.2) and Schoten (678). They only followed Bayern Munich (2,706) registered more fit in the last third than Barca (2,626).
Barca’s success was led by their sensational attacking displays. Raphinha registered 56 target involvement (34 goals, 22 assists) in all competitions, while only Kylian Mbappe (43) scored more goals among players in Europe’s top five competitions than Robert Lewandowski (42).
Yamal led Laliga for assists (13-four free from another player), while the 18-year-old also tried (309) and most dribbles of each player in Spain’s top flight. To put the last stat in perspective, Sevillas Dodi Lukebakio recorded the second most successful dribbles in Laliga, with 84.
Barca missed athletic star Williams, but has put Marcus Rashford on loan from Manchester United to further strengthen their attack.
It is therefore no surprise that our model depicts Barca as favorites – they retain the title in 46.5% of the simulations of the supercomputer. There is a chance of 26.4% that the Flick team finishes second, and only a chance of 13.6% they miss on the top three – something that has not happened since 2003.
Madrid now has a 32.1% chance to get the crown back.
The model actually gives Madrid a greater chance of winning the title than second (28.7%), while they finish third in 16.9% of the Sims.
Atletico only gets a chance of 11.7% to win their third competition crown under Simeone, with third place their most likely destination (21.2%), where the supercomputer predicts a struggle for the top four as a more likely outcome than a title win.
Villarreal (3.7%) and athletic (2.9%) are the only other teams that have more than 2%chance of winning the title, but it is difficult to see someone outside Laliga’s established elite challenge for the trophy. Not since Valencia, in 2004, has a different club than Madrid, Barca or Atletico has been crowned champions.
The top-four struggle
While the race for the title appears between the big three again, 19 of the 20 Laliga clubs in the top four ended in at least 1% of the 10,000 simulations of the model.
The top five clubs in Laliga qualified for the Champions League last season, so a fifth place is perhaps enough and that would be the case again this time, then all 20 games are with a shot.
Villarreal and Athletic are expected to leave it for fourth place – the yellow submarine has a chance of 13.8% to conquer it, with the chance of the Basque club at 13.2%.
In general, the chances of Villarreal to secure a top-four finish and therefore guarantee a Champions League place, 37.7%. The chance that this is athletic is 34%.
But while Villarreal will look at rebuilding after the departure of Alex Baena and Thierno Barry, Athletic have held their strong core so far.
Williams registered 10 targeted involvement with Laliga (five goals, five assists), while his older brother Inaki contributed 14 (six goals, eight assists). Oihan Sancet scored top with 15 goals from midfield, so there is a lot of talent about Ernesto Valverde’s decision.
Valverde built his team on solid foundations last season – Only Atletico (33.6) had a lower XGA in the past term than Athletics (38.4) in Laliga. If they can keep track of that performance level, there is no doubt about their top-four references.
Real Betis, which reached the Conference League final last season, is predicted as sixth, although the chance that they will end up in the top four drops to 17.6%.
Real Sociedad had a disappointing season according to their standards, where Europe went completely wrong. They finished 11th, their lowest placement since they took the 2017-18 season in the 12th.
Sergio Francisco has taken over the long-term coach Imanol Alguacil, moved from the B-team of La Real. However, La Real is more likely to be relegated (10.8%) than to finish in the top four (7.5%).
Osasuna (11.2%), Celta Vigo (10.1%) and Valencia (7.3%) probably do not seem to insist on the Champions League, but certainly belong to the European contenders.
Girona was the surprise package in Laliga in 2023-24, but ended up in the 16th last season and has only a 3% chance of getting the top four.
Sevilla, sevenfold Europa League/UEFA Cup champions, finished 17th in 2024-25, and their chances of a top-six finish ranking at only 8.7%.
Rayo Vallecano hit well above their weight to secure their joint best finish in LaLiga (eighth) and to reach the qualifications of the Conference League. They have a chance of 25.4% to repeat a top-line finish, but our model predicts a lower half of finishing.
The relegation struggle
There are no overwhelming favorites for the drop, who will be music in the ears of the fans of the newly promoted trio, Real Oviedo, Elche and Levante. That said, those teams are those whose model predicts that they will come to the second level, the end of the season.
Oviedo, who defeated Mirandes in the promotion-play-off at the end of June, are back in Big Time for the first time since 2000-01.
They fell in 32.7% of the Sims of the model, although Elche is actually the team that will most likely end the bottom of the stack (13.1%).
Elche’s chances of survival are 67.4%, so only 0.1% more than that of Oviedo.
Levante, which was the second layer at the top last season, has the best chance of staying between the promoted teams, with 70.6%.
Getafe ended in the 13th in 2024-25, although only two points above the lower three, that was the busy nature of the lower half. They fall in 28.7% of the scenarios of the supercomputer.
Espanyol will hope that the departure of star artist Joan Garcia will not derail their chances to their city rivals Barca – the chance that they will stay up at 75.2%.
The decline of Sevilla in recent years was grim. They won the Europa League in 2023, but have ended 13th and 17th since then. As soon as a normal top-four competitioner, the Andalusian club will hope that they can avoid a relegation this year-according to our model there is a chance of 23.7% that they will fall.
#Laliga #Barcelona #title #tight #relegation #struggle #predicted #football #news