RFEF confirm Barca-Osasuna will be played on 27 March

Despite opposition from both teams, Barca-Osasuna will be played on Thursday, 27 March. This is what the RFEF has decided after rejecting the appeals lodged by both clubs, who preferred to make up the match postponed due to the death of Dr. Carles Minarro between the 37th and 38th La Liga matchdays.

The National Committee of Second Instance of the Royal Spanish Football Federation on Thursday ratified the decision of the sole judge of professional competitions Jose Alberto Pelaez, leaving both teams unhappy and basing its decision on the need to make up the postponed matches on the first available date.

Although Barcelona will have to face the match without their South American internationals, 27 March is certainly the first date on which the majority of their squad would be available to play. Otherwise, both teams would have to spend the entire crucial stretch of the season with a game in hand and would not know where they really stand until the week of 26 May.

From the RFEF's point of view, this could affect the development of the competition, as at this time of the year the matchday schedule is already unified. It would be preferable for Ronald Araujo or Raphinha to be absent rather than this circumstance. The Uruguayan and the Brazilian face Argentina and Colombia respectively on the night of the 25th to the 26th, which would make it impossible for them to return on time and with the necessary rest hours.

Barca argue that there is already a precedent of a match being postponed in these circumstances, as in 2017 a Celta-Real Madrid game had to be cancelled due to the poor state of the roof of Balaídos in the middle of a windstorm. Then, that match corresponding to matchday 21 was played on 17 May, between the same dates 37 and 38.

The other way to play the game at another time would have been if Azulgrana had been eliminated from the Champions League, as this competition and the Copa del Rey, as well as the midweek fixtures to recover from the break, are the ones they will be playing every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday until the end of the season. However, the regulations require the date to be decided and fixed as soon as possible, which prevented the RFEF from leaving the match up in the air at the expense of whether or not Barcelona advance to the next round.