Lazy King! Rashford was punished by Barcelona for being late and has slept again this time

The Champions League has just staged a double-scoring show in the mid-week Champions League. After returning to La Liga, Barcelona coach Flick chose not to let Rashford start because the Barcelona striker was late for training. More prepared, Rashford was late for the morning meeting on the game day. Rashford was expected to start in the La Liga against Getafe at home, but Flick finally chose to withdraw the England international from the starting lineup.

Just a few days ago, Rashford scored twice in the Champions League match against Newcastle, and returned to his courage, which seemed to have regained the rhythm of his career in Catalonia. However, according to Spanish media Le World Sports, Rashford was late in the morning meeting of training camp before Sunday's game.

A source confirmed that Rashford was indeed "a little late", but it was not certain that this was the real reason why he missed the start; head coach Hansey Flick also underestimated the so-called "problem". "This is normal. We have to play every three or four days," Frick said when talking about the rest of Rashford, who had just won the middle of the week. "Fresh legs are needed on the court."

Frick implemented "zero tolerance" for being late: last weekend defeated Valencia, Rafinia was placed on the bench for being late for activating training; Jur Conde and Iniaki Pena also violated his iron law for similar reasons. However, the source stressed that Rashford was "just a little late" and did not take the matter much seriously. As punishment, Rashford sat on the bench and Ferran Torres replaced him into the starting lineup. His substitute scored twice in the first half of the game, helping Barcelona take a 2-0 lead. After halftime, Rashford came on as a substitute to replace Lafinia. He then participated in the team's third goal, broke through Getafe's defense and passed it with a cross, assisted Ormo to score, and finally helped Barcelona defeat Getafe 3-0 at home, and remained unbeaten in 5 rounds of La Liga (4 wins and 1 draw).

This is not the first time that Rashford has been deprecated for being late. In the 2022/23 season when he performed well under Eric Tenhach, the Dutch manager had excluded him from the start of the game against Wolves because of his lateness. Rashford admitted that he was placed on the bench for oversleeping. But he then came out on the bench and scored the winning goal to make up for the mistake.

Tenhach called this violation an "internal discipline issue" at the time and chose to press Rashford on the bench and didn't send him on the court until the second half, eventually helping the team win the game. After the game, Rashford said: "Yes, this is obviously a violation of the team rules, and I think it is a possible mistake."