Barcelona, the league’s top team, lost to Leganes 1-0 on Sunday. The wasteful home team lost its second straight league game in front of its own supporters, but defender Sergio Gonzalez’s early header was enough to shock them.

Barcelona has been struggling in the league for more than a month, winning just one of its last six league games, but it has been outstanding in the Champions League, winning five of its last six games.

With 38 points, Barca is still ahead of Real Madrid in third place and tied with Atletico Madrid, whom it will face on Saturday. Both of its title opponents still have games left to play.

With 18 points, Leganes finished 15th in the standings after their first-ever victory at Barcelona.

After four minutes, visiting captain Gonzalez climbed unchallenged at the near post and sent a powerful header past goalkeeper Inaki Pena to give Leganes the lead from a corner.

Barca tried for the equalizer right away, but despite controlling the game with more than 80% of the ball, it was unable to overcome Leganes’ well-organized and disciplined five-man defense and missed a few chances.

16 of its 20 efforts in the game missed the mark, and when it did, it struck Leganes goalkeeper Marko Dmitrovic, who produced three incredible saves in the first half.

After excellent individual play by Raphinha down the line, the 32-year-old Serbian goalkeeper made a brilliant reflex save to deny Robert Lewandowski’s first-time attempt in the 10th minute. He then performed his magic in the 33rd minute, palming a Raphinha volley against the crossbar and stepping up again a few minutes later to block a Lewandowski effort when the striker was one-on-one.

After the interval, the host’s annoyance increased as it lost multiple opportunities, with Raphinha, Lamine Yamal, and Dani Olmo all squandering good chances with Lewandowski and Jules Kounde missing close-range sitters.

Pedri told DAZN, clearly frustrated, “After what happened today, we can’t possibly go home feeling happy.”

We need to improve going into games because we lacked the spark necessary to score goals up front. We can’t let our opponents score goals early on like this. I believe we had generated opportunities, but we must know how to close the deal. We have been having trouble in La Liga, and it’s difficult to pinpoint the reason, but we must move forward,” he continued.