After being shocked in the Europa League by Eintracht Frankfurt, there is a slight feeling of anti-climax in Barcelona’s season, with most seeing it unlikely that the Blaugrana can catch Real Madrid in the league.
Seen in the cold light of day, the post-mortem of Thursday match didn’t look much kinder to Xavi Hernandez and his team. Perhaps the toughest job the Egarense has is working out how to motivate his players for the final stretch of the season.
During his pre-match press conference for Barcelona’s upcoming match with Cadiz, Xavi was asked how they are going about returning the team to form.
“By encouraging the group and making the players see what we are not doing well. We are on the right path, but the results need to be arriving.”
Barcelona had been on a fairly consistent upward curve of improvement until that point, with a 15 game unbeaten run in La Liga and seeing off Galatasaray and Napoli in the Europa League.
Once again, their European struggles came back to haunt them. Sport reported Xavi’s thoughts on the issue.
“Consolidating the model of play that was lost requires time. We need to learn from our mistakes. It has been five years since we competed well in Europe. Our project started in November, we need time. There have been green shoots, but it’s evident that we need to improve.”
Finally, the manager was asked exactly what Barcelona needed to improve.
“We have to improve the concentration at the start of the match. Going ahead on the scoreboard is key these days. When the other team goes in front, it’s very difficult to comeback.”
Image via Valenti Enrich / Sport.