 Following the star signings of Neymar and Luis Suárez to Barcelona, and Gareth Bale and Karim Benzema to Madrid, the rivalry was expanded to a battle of the clubs' attacking trios, BBC (Bale, Benzema, Cristiano) against MSN (Messi, Suárez, Neymar).Ronaldo left Real Madrid for Juventus in 2018, and in the week prior to the first meeting of the teams in the 2018–19 La Liga, Messi sustained an arm injury ruling him out of the match.It would be the first time since 2007 that the "Clásico" had featured neither player, with some in the media describing it as the 'end of an era’.