The Heaviest Defeats in FC Barcelona's History

As a long-serving member of Europe's elite, Barcelona are in the business of dishing out devastating defeats rather than being on the receiving end of them.

This is a club with 26 league titles, 30 domestic cup triumphs and just the five victories in the continent's premier competition. However, even the best get beaten and as storied as Barcelona's history is, they have not always dominated the summit of the footballing pyramid.

Over the course of the club's existence - spanning more than 120 years - the Catalan institution have been on the wrong side of some seismic humblings. In light of the latest addition to this list, here are Barcelona's heaviest competitive defeats.

6. 2019/20 - Barcelona 2-8 Bayern Munich

A result of this magnitude has understandably raised myriad questions aimed at those in red and blue on the pitch, the manager casually leaning against his dugout and the inept hierarchy watching from afar. However, what does this mean for Philippe Coutinho?

The Barcelona loanee came on to assist or score Bayern's final three goals, taking the scoreline from embarrassing to historic. If he does return to Spain, it will certainly make for an awkward first few training sessions to say the least.

5. 1934/35 - Real Madrid 8-2 Barcelona

Somehow Bayern Munich were not the first team to beat Barça 8-2, that honour fell to Real Madrid in February 1935. At the time there was a gulf in quality between the two fabled rivals: Madrid had won two of the three previous top flight titles while Barcelona finished ninth of ten teams in the 1933/34 campaign.

It remains the biggest ever win in a La Liga Clásico although Barcelona would rapidly avenge the result with a 5-0 victory back in Catalunya eight months later.

4. 1945/46 - Sevilla 8-0 Barcelona

Few go into any game predicting an eight-goal winning margin, but such a scoreline would have been utterly unthinkable when Sevilla hosted Barcelona in the Copa del Generalísimo round of 16 in 1946.

Sevilla had pipped Barça to that season's La Liga title by a single point and failed to win either of their two league meetings.

Yet, ten minutes after having Vicente Colino sent off, Barcelona conceded two quick-fire goals as half time approached.

The second 45 minutes would bring Barça's capitulation, as they swiftly went 5-0 down before José Bravo joined Colino for an early bath on the hour mark. José Palacios Herrera made it 8-0 in the 78th minute taking his personal tally to five on the night (he only scored eight all season).

Barcelona were able to salvage a scrap of dignity as they won the second leg 1-0, albeit against a Sevilla side resting their key players.

3. 1940/41 - Sevilla 11-1 Barcelona

When Barcelona's José Valle opened the scoring after ten minutes in the club's first game of the season, it was the perfect start. The previous campaign had seen Barça finish above the relegation playoff places by virtue of a narrowly superior head-to-head record with Celta Vigo.

Less than 15 minutes after Valle's strike, Sevilla found the net themselves. Then again. And again. And again. In the space of five first-half minutes, the Andalusians had gone from 1-0 down to 4-1 up.

Seven more goals found Barcelona's net in the second half as the Catalans were ravaged by Sevilla's front five - christened by the press at the time the 'Stuka' forward line after the German dive bomber used in the Spanish Civil War and World War II.

2. 1942/43 - Real Madrid 11-1 Barcelona

Barcelona's players were bombarded by a sonic assault with the deafening roar of 20,000 piercing whistles as they trundled out at Real's Chamartin.

Los Blancos had lost the first leg of this Spanish Cup semi-final 3-0 in convincing fashion. The tensions surrounding the return fixture were whipped up into a frenzy by former Madrid goalkeeper-turned journalist Eduardo Teus, who implored the home ground to intimidate their opponents as Barcelona had done to them in the previous match.

A truly toxic atmosphere was Barcelona goalkeeper Lluis Miró pelted with coins each time he approached his goal line, unable to do much to halt a revenge-seeking Real race into an 8-0 half-time lead – particularly down to ten men after a questionable sending off.

At the time, Francisco Franco was Spain's dictator and the story goes that - as Madrid, the capital side were supposedly 'Franco's Team' - a trip from a colonel into Barcelona's changing room during the interval ensured the Catalans returned to the field to concede three more.

Arguably the most famous quote from the game came from Barça's reserve goalkeeper Fernando Argila, who said of El Clasico: "There was no rivalry. Not, at least, until that game."

1. 1930/31 - Athletic Club 12-1 Barcelona

By the end of the drubbing, Ramón Llorens left the field in tears. The Catalan-born goalkeeper devoted his entire footballing career to Barcelona, but will ultimately be known as the man who conceded 12 goals in the single biggest La Liga defeat ever.

Barcelona may have won the first ever La Liga title two years earlier, but this Athletic Club side - let (and revolutionised) by the English manager Fred Pentland - were at the peak of their powers.

1931 saw them claim their second consecutive league and cup double as their physical style overpowered their contemporaries and would form the foundation for the spirit of 'La Furia Roja' which characterised the Spanish national team for so long.

During this period of success, Athletic would celebrate a victory by snatching Pentland's bowler hat - which he was famous for - from his head and jumping up and down on the accessory until it was destroyed.

After a 12-1 win, it's safe to say Pentland was due a trip to the millinery.