Real close gap at top to one point
First three league goals Barca have conceded
Ronaldo has scored in 11 games in a row
Suarez assisted Neymar opener
Immediate response? Cristiano Ronaldo cuts inside from the left and is fouled 25 yards out, towards the corner of the box. Free-kick, we all know who's taking it, but the Portuguese star whacks it into the wall.
One hundred and eighty beats per minute football.
The English eyes will automatically focus on Luis Suarez's part in that goal, but Barcelona's opener was all about Neymar, jagging in off the left flank and arrowing a superb finish past Iker Casillas.
Image source, Reuters
Image source, Getty ImagesLuis Suarez plays a crossfield pass to Neymar who controls with his chest, cuts inside and curls a beauty of a low shot into the corner, no chance for Iker Casillas. What a start!
Terrific noise around the Bernabeu as Barcelona immediately get the ball rolling and immediately launch a sustained spell of possession. Luis Suarez gets a touch after 18 seconds and Real don't touch the ball until more than a minute has elapsed. No danger though.
Real assert their status by unveiling a huge banner depicting each of their 10 European trophies - six more than Barca - behind one of the goals as the players emerge.
We are under way.
Andy West
European football writer
"A friendly moment in the tunnel between Dani Alves and Marcelo - international team-mates but club foes today - as the players wait to come out.
"Iker Casillas is doing his best to look relaxed, leaning back with his arms folded and a smile on a face, but he's under huge pressure after his recent gaffes."
Image source, Getty ImagesJust 500 Barcelona fans are allowed to take in El Clasico in person. Luis Suarez takes care to pay tribute to the travelling contingent as he heads back to the dressing room. Just four minutes to the off.
Everton midfielder Ross Barkley tweets:, external Who'll win the El Clasico? I'm saying Barca.
The last Uruguayan to play in El Clasico was?
Image source, Getty ImagesPablo Garcia in 2006. Luis Suarez joins an elite club of his countrymen.
Garcia only played 22 league games in three years at the Bernabeu. Something tells me Suarez will have a bigger impact in Spain.
Image source, ReutersThe journey that has taken Luis Suarez from sweeping Uruguayan streets to El Clasico is one worthy of the Andrew Lloyd Webber treatment.
He met Sofia Balbi as a 15-year-old., external She was from the right side of town, he wasn't. When her family moved to Spain in 2003, they were forced apart and he was left with football as his only hope of following her.
This summer, nine years, a marriage and two children later, he finally completed his mission.
Paul Johnson, external has sent us the best Barcelona and Real Madrid composite team of his lifetime. This team couldn't do it on a cold night in Stoke.
Image source, Getty ImagesAll-time XI: Casillas; Puyol, Hierro, R.Carlos, Xavi, Zidane, Messi, Rivaldo, Ronaldo, C.Ronaldo, Raul.
We've been asking you to name a best starting XI made up of current players from Barca and Real.
Tomas:Ter Stegen, Alba, Alves, Varane, Pique, Xavi, Iniesta, Isco, Ronaldo, Messi, Neymar.
Chris Clarke, Belfast: Casillas, Alves, Ramos, Pique, Alba, Busquets, Modric, Iniesta, Ronaldo, Messi, Suarez.
Travelling away to your biggest rivals in front of a global television audience of about half a billion people. It should be enough to get the butterflies fluttering.
But Barcelona have been gambolling around like spring lambs in training.
Luis Suarez got up to mischief with a prank on Gerard Pique...
Image source, Getty Images...before Lionel Messi wreaked revenge. I think I would rather take the flick-on-the-ear punishment.
Image source, Getty Images
Image source, Getty Images"Nine years ago we witnessed an equally star-studded Clasico collision, when Madrid's 4-2 win at the Bernabeu saw David Beckham, Raul, World Cup winners Zinedine Zidane, Ronaldo and Roberto Carlos plus Michael Owen pull apart a Barca side decorated by Ronaldinho, Samuel Eto'o, Xavi and Andres Iniesta.
"So why the feeling this week that Saturday night in Madrid might outstrip them all, even with the caveats that history brings?"
BBC chief sports writer Tom Fordyce has taken the long view on the historic fixture. And failed to mention Thomas Gravesen in his list of Galacticos.
As Luis Enrique and Carlo Ancelotti prepare their pre-match pep-talks, consider the unwanted one delivered to Barca at the Bernabeu in 1943.
Leading 3-0 after the first leg of the Generalissimo Cup, Barcelona were visited in the dressing room by an unidentified official.
"Do not forget that some of you are only playing because of the generosity of the regime that has forgiven you for your lack of patriotism," he told them, referring to the country's recent civil war and Catalonia's opposition to General Franco, a Real Madrid fan.
Madrid won 11-1 to advance to the final.
Image source, ASAS meanwhile just let the quality wash over us, with pen pics of the star-studded line-ups.
It doesn't need much more than that to get the juices flowing...
This morning's Spanish sports paper Marca have got Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi rampaging around the Madrid skyline like football's version of Godzilla versus King Kong.
"The two titans of football go head to head in the biggest game in football," reads the headline. Roughly anyway...
Image source, Marca