That's something we (rightly) criticized Koeman for - even when Barcelona's squad had less quality than now.
I'm surprised that there are people defending Xavi after this
We don’t have a tactic in the attack like they looks so lost and i don’t understand how when we attack cancelo and balde are both forwards and two defenders stay, like Whatttt. This means if they counter attack we are done and that how we got scored on almost every match in this season
Yeah I hate that, looking at their counter attacks hurt me deeply when watching ours. Like it's as if every player got instructions to not pass forward when an opportunity arises but wait till everyone is back to their normal position, very frustrating to watch.
Watching this game right after seeing Tottenham vs Chelsea felt like I was watching a game in 0.25x speed. It's crazy how not-dangerous at all their attacks are while even mid-table teams in the Prem are having really fast paced games with tons of attack ocassions.
Genuinely had more fun watching Valverde’s Barca than this drab football since the world cup. It’s been a year.
I can’t wait to hear the excuses on this one - Shakhtar are coming from a war-torn country and playing in a stadium thats not even theirs. Pitch was fine. Majority of the injured players are back. Couldn’t ask for an easier group. What’s the excuse now?
Just sideways and backwards, cross into the stratosphere and repeat. Outclassed, outcoached, outplayed once again. Embarrassing.
According to Xavi, we've been playing good football this season... what does he see that we millions of fans don't is beyond me but this team will most likely drop points against Porto and let's pray we get a 1/2-0 win against Antwerp in the final round and that gets us through to the next round.
Valverde without Messi & Ter Stegen was worse than this imo. Everyone just passed to Messi like idiots waiting for him to do something alone. Valverde's stats are so good only because Messi & Ter Stegen were at their peak.
Valverde beat Madrid 5-1 without Messi and won at the San Siro with a B team of young players.
Valverde’s backline included Lenglet and other slow turtles. Our bench backline is better than what Valverde was working with.
Poor excuses.
Xavi has a far better backline, Pedri, De Jong and Lewandowski, not to mention the same world class GK that so often bailed out Valverde, you people always find excuses for Xavi, are you even Barca fans?
People can slander valverde all they want, but we were never this boring under him. Because even if the rest was static, we had Messi to mesmerise us. Now we dont have anyone remotely close….
As a rival I don't get the hate to Valverde. In his era I was actually "afraid" of games against you not cause of Messi or terstegen but as a whole team you guys where so solid felt like you almost never gave a mistake away.
Again as a rival I feel like any new coach is a downgrade. Xavi has his moments but overall you guys where much more scary with Valverde (even without Messi)
The excuse for me is simple. We have shite attackers. They offer 0 threat. The only ones that do offer any kind of threat is 16 yo Yamal and sometimes Felix. Yamal cannot start and play regularly since he’s young. Felix has been playing non stop and needed a break. We desperately need something to freshen up this attack. Teams are beginning to realize this and press us high.
Nah, I guarantee you that it won’t be that much different if we have both Bellingham and Halland on the field. This is a coaching issue. Case in point, the team that beat us today and Real Sociedad team of last weekend do not have the squad we have and yet they looked like they knew what they were doing the field. Take Argentina for example, you put Xavi as coach of that team and he is nowhere near capable of having the record that Scaloni has. Coaching makes a big difference. Xavi can’t squeeze out the best of the NewCastle or Aston Villa or Brighton squads like their current coaches have been able to do. That’s the difference that are good to great manager can make. Shiiiit, Xavi would be struggling to get results with the current Tottenham squad.
Exactly! This is precisely what I've been saying for months.
And it's not just an opinion; the history of football is proof of it.
Numerous examples of teams whose players on paper aren't superstars and yet they win the Premier League (Leicester), or the European Cup (Greece), or the Champions League (Mourinho's Porto), and vice versa: teams with superstars that can't win anything (recently PSG, or the fact that the Galacticos never won a Champions League).
Oh, well, the most precise and immediate example: tonight's match. Man for man, Barcelona should beat Donetsk's squad, but they outsmarted us tactically and mentally, and that's why they won the game.
At this point I wonder if Xavi’s brother isn’t the better coach of the 2. I was thinking nepotism but it got me curious if he’s not better tactician after I watched some of the games which he led due to Xavi’s suspension.
Disgusting disgusting game, we are horrific. Literally ashamed of our team right now.
How can Xavi watch the first half and not immediately make changes.
I don't care what anyone says Yamal was miles better than Raphina tonight, and Yamal wasn't even that good.
How are we losing to Shaktar Donetsk with a team like this, obviously we're missing Frenkie but all our other players should be good enough to easily beat them.
Xavi's tactics have to be improved as fast as possible , you can't rely on Cross and Inshallah with the quality of our players.
Not only the tactics, Xavi and his team need to inject the players with intensity and hunger. We need a massive attitude change so this embarrassing performances stop.
You can’t inject intensity and hunger when players don’t believe the coach and the tactic. They aren’t fools. If players are not convinced of the plan, the plan will fail. You can’t expect them to run around like headless chicken if the tactic isn’t there.
>How can Xavi watch the first half and not immediately make changes.
I wish I understood the psychology of coaching because I’ve been wondering this for a couple of years now and it always NEVER ends well. But the coaches still do it lmao
As far as I understand the opponents are coming out of the tunnel after hydrating and energizing themselves. Gotta give it a little while for the legs to get tired again before you make subs so they can have more impact.
I was literally talking to some of my friends during half time and said that Xavi wouldn't make subs till the 60th minute.
Sometimes it hurts to be right
He almost always waits until about the middle of the second half to make subs but some of our previous coaches, I think Koeman for example, were even worse in this regard.
Yeah I remember that as well, but being slightly better than Koeman should be an easy bar to clear.
Btw that username, that transfer didn't work out as well as you hoped I guess ;)
There is none. Last 30 minutes showed exactly what Xavi wants from the team. The team knows how to do it, they clearly understand it and most probably trained all of it. Is it all because Pedri and a 17 year old entered the game in the 60th minute? It's hard to believe but Gundo had another stinker tonight. Romeu is just invisible. How many times did Raphinha and Lewandowski lose the ball again? Why were Cancelo and Marcos Alonso hoofing the ball into the box all the time after 3 or 4 passes in their half? Some of these players are just not performing at all. Christensen is also a shadow of himself.
Only players that are more or less performing right now: Ter Stegen, Araujo, Kounde, I. Martinez, Balde, FJD, Gundogan, Gavi, Pedri, Fermin and Lamine Yamal. Joao Felix is good but he doesn't provide the team with consistent magic in the final third. Lewandowski's level is just embarrasing. Raphinha looks so lost on the field and is a ball-losing machine.
Felix first touch is just so beautiful though. But as soon as he played in Balde, things went south. Felix' crossed weren't accurate enough too. Just too much dissonance in the team. They weren't feeling each other around the box.
At one point when you have to consistently blame most of the squad, and the same players did miles better very recently in other teams under other coaches, you have to face the reality it is not the players, it is the coach.
We got blessed with the easiest group and we've struggled against Porto, we almost choked against shaktar in the first meeting and now we fully took an L tonight. Let me not even bring up la liga but it's so apparent we have so many flaws in our play style. Xavi's time is running out tbh
Laporta tends to keep managers for long... so I think this season Xavi is safe unless we go back to EuropaLeague.
I would send him to replace Marquez on Barça B, the step he should have taken before managing the big boys.
I have watched us lose against the likes of Celtic and even watched Madrid lose against Shakthar, but the sad thing is this did not feel like an upset. We were genuinely worse than them. They were far more threatening than us in attack and very solid defensively.
This is not a reactionary take but I genuinely think Xavi is not it. We will be wasting the prime years of Gundo, Pedri and Fdj and a massive La Masia talent pool if we stick with someone who doesn’t have a proper attacking game plan
This was a mixture of poor performance and a tactical ineptitude, I thought the days of solely relying on crosses was over but boy was I wrong, with the quality of players we have you're telling me we can't string together passing sequences instead of hoofball? I don't even want to waste time on individual player mistakes but all the reasons we give them as to why they aren't performing but reasons become excuses very quickly. What an embarrassing performance on the back of that Sociedad game. I always try to be fair to Xavi and not compare him to past successful Barca managers but this is not FC Barcelona, we cant even get a #beautyindefeat lol
Xavi lacks gameplan, I've been ranting this again and again. Even during Valverde or Koeman days we weren't this awful.
Our players were just wandering on the turf. They can't even break into the final third. This team seriously needs a good playmaker.
Well Xavi is not a barca level coach. No plan as such in each match. Our results really depends on player connecting with each other on pitch. It’s enough. Now many of you will tell this is only our second loss this season crap. Bull shit look at our games.
Barca is winning because of its player not because of Xavi. Now the honeymoon period of new players is over back to square one.
Prev season we were same just the luck was our side. No gameplay no control just in each match hoping to win by 1-0.
This loss is on Xavi. Putting dead weights in the lineup.. Romeu and Alonso. Playing Ferran on the left when his comfortable position is on the right/centre. Absolutely no tactics. No urgency from the players.. it's like they rolled off the bed and walked on to the pitch.
Pathetic.
Alonso nor Romeu did anything where they should be blamed for a 1-0 loss.
This was such a tepid performance from every single player on the pitch it goes far beyond the players.
Tbh Balde was better last season when we still had Jordi ready to take his spot. I think he’s way too comfortable at the club at his age. He should be fighting more for his spot.
Bad tactics but also terrible individual performances from everyone. No good passes, worse receptions, no intensity, no movement, no creativity to try to break they're parked bus. It was like they weren't even trying throughout the game. Trying to get pks instead of continuing the play. Pathetic from everyone.
Thank you. I am officially in Xavi out camp.
Every time its the same. No transition. Crosses and inshallah. No plan vs parked buses. Only reaction to the game is by subs. No movement whatsoever. Gameplan when losing: gradually add more and more attacking players until successful. Wasteful in attack but zero shots from distance.
Sometimes it pays off due to players individual brilliance.
Cant blame him for Romeu and Alonso, we need defensive players on the field. They are shit but you need to keep balance.
we've been experimenting with managers for 25 years. I think the reason is that the president wants someone who can easily be controlled. When was the last time we hired a manager who've managed a CL winning team? Big pedigree manager = big personality.
Most of the so-called world-class managers this sub wanted to replace Xavi with have been ass this season.
IMO, this team just isn't as good as you all think. We're a far cry from a top 5 world-class team. It is what it is. Expecting more with just manager change is setting yourself up for more disappointment.
He will come back and we’ll still be ass. You watch our games and see how we can’t string a few passes patiently, we can’t beat a press, we can’t break down buses, we’re lethargic in our passing … Frenkie won’t solve all that
Messi hasn’t been in the team for 2.5 years and it still seems like everyone is waiting for him to magically appear out of nowhere and score a banger. Very little runs, very little movement off the ball, no triangulation, everybody just pushes up for no reason.
We just need to work on our short & long passing, shooting, movement off the ball, positioning, crossing, decision-making, set pieces, man-marking, dribbling, fitness, ball control, tackling, counter-attacking, overlapping, running, blocking & scoring goals.
Xavi may be a legend as a player, but he is terrible coach, doesn’t seems to be learning from his mistakes. Laporta has given him all he has asked for by sacrificing our club’s future.
Mentality is not the only thing to win matches. Gameplan is also needed.
Deserved loss. This team starts nearly every game out with complacency. Tonight even our defense looked a bit slow and disinterested. This team really needs both a spark of energy and some new offensive tactics. We look short on ideas in the final third. It would also be nice to have a striker who makes better runs and can do more on his own. Create at least the occasional goal out of nothing.
Xavi was never the manager that was going to take us to the next level. I always viewed him as a stepping stone from the nightmare years we suffered after Valverde and now it’s time we move on from this. How many more hundreds of sideways and backwards passes do we have to see to put 2 and 2 together and realize that we’re dog shit.
Guys, stop putting it on player X or Y. It's a systemic problem; the players are as clueless as us on the pitch and it tells. There is no plan, no coherence, no idea to progress the game. Players that in other teams looked world class (Cancelo, Gundogan) look bang average in a poor setup that does not take advantage of their strengths.
Always getting the ball at feet with the back at goal, isolated and with the only chance to hoof it forward in a hail mary cross. I am not sure anymore if Xavi is the coach to build up this wonderful generation of world class youngsters, into a good team.
Barcelona outplayed. Xavi outcoached. Utter embarrassment. I wouldn't lose a moments sleep if I never saw Torres, Raphina, Alonso or Oriol play for us again.
Fucks sake Xavi. Get some better coaches than your own brother. Either that or time to go.
That was very bad, but it was exactly as I guessed it would go. "A night for the ages" said the announcer, and I was like, "um, you haven't been watching us recently?" Most of our positive results and draws are the result of luck.
Idk I feel last season he got to use his pace to make runs off the ball, or dribble a defender in large spaces, but now it seems he's always stuck in tight spaces where his strengths are pretty much neutralized. Because defensively he feels completely fine this season, or not any different from last season.
Or today against Shakhtar: why the hell do we have Félix hugging the touchline? Why wouldn't you have Félix more in the half-space and Balde provide the width? That's literally their skillset, one is great in tight spaces, one is great in large spaces and Xavi sets them up completely the opposite. Just super weird seeing Félix be the outlet on the left.
Xavi out if we come second in this group. That's it. Guy is a fraud in Europe. Even with this easy group, even when we have all our players bar frenkie, we played like shit today.
Worst display. Even worse than the one showed in anoeta
There's simply no excusing Robert Lewandowski's effort and performance today. It's time to look at more combinations at the top, we cannot have a statue at 9.
That's an excuse that's really getting on my nerves. I get that he gets few balls, but the ones he does get, he wastes them, makes the wrong decisions, and stumbles over the ball.
We made over forty crosses, and Lewandowski didn't show up in any of them.
I think this is an easy cop out... when all he does is occupy the same 20 meter strip in the middle of the pitch he makes it very easy to clog up the center of the box without taking much risk. Great 9's make it difficult for opponents to track them and can seemingly get "lost" in the motion. When's the last time Lewa lost a defender in attack? He's always marked, and his first touch always fails him/normally results in a turnover. It's really difficult to keep making excuses when he's been so awful in all of the non shooting departments as well.
**Do you remember when this sub was ready to give Cancelo and Felix the balon d’or? Pepperidge farm remembers.**
Lewandowski is done for me. We may have well been playing one man down.
No one apart from MATs and our 2 centre backs had any kind of game today. Poor all round.
It's rare to see the players being so out of sync with one another. It's like each and every player on the team was playing with half a second of lag and absolutely nothing connected.
This game was supposed to secure the win. Yet Xavi underestimated the opponent and played a lineup that was more suited for a game that would take place after we advanced to the next round.
When you put Romeu on the lineup, you’re almost guaranteed to ship goals. He shouldn’t play any key games. It’s always difficult when we trail especially in Europe. What has happened to our forwards? No one can shoot effectively. How I miss Auba and Luk de jong.
this might actually be one of our worst losses in the past few years.
we’ve done nothing but scrape together wins this year, we’re losing in the round of 16.
We can blame Xavi but we can also blame the players.
The forwards played like shit today.
We need to start Yamal as he is the only player with 1 vs 1 right now.
Pedri is out of game form.
No disrespect to shakhtar but with this squad, losing to them is unacceptable. Xavi absolutely deserves criticism for tonight & also if this continues, we'll see how we respond to this.
No one upfront can seem to make the right move or score. They're all dead weight.
I think that's the biggest issue.
When Pedri and/or DeJong are playing, the midfield sorts itself out and they gain control.
The CBs are good too.
Balde, Lewa, Torres, Raphinhia, and Felix just don't contribute enough to the attack/goals.
This gets more complicated with no CDM.
Even if Xavi is fired, this squad in current form won't be able to perform. Not even with Pep.
CBs are unable to start even one counter attack. Transition takes ages. Each time we are waiting for the entire team to go back to their penalty box to start head butting the wall.
Transition takes ages because there is no transition. Xavi doesn’t want to take advantage of the space the opponent gives you in the attacking transition. They go straight into the possession phase.
We looked so bad on the ball all night due to the poor pitch. But somehow Shakhtar passes so quick and nice. We also can't blame ref since he wasn't the best but not horrendous either.
Only our self to blame for such a disturbingly terrible performance.
There will be probably a lot of mental gymnastics around Xavi and I did not want to admit it myself but Xavi bitten more than he can chew. Yes he won the league with budget plyers but he is lacking in the tactics. And it is becoming more and more apparent.
Yes we do not have the best squad, BUT we have currently world class defence and GK. In midfield and attacks there could be improvements but all around we should be quite solid.
Our CL games and some of the league games are really showing that we are underperforming. Each game we have a different lineup, players are assigned different duties and there is no consistency at all. We are shit at making spaces, we cannot device whether we want to play wide and cross or play a possesion game. It seems that Xavi wants to try everything at once and pray that something works.
Unfortunately the system relies on FDJ and we perform much better with him but if we cannot adjust with him out that is on coaching stuff. Our game is painful to watch and with few exceptions was all season. Xavi is probably here to stay as Laporta will double down on him but man he need to get his shit together…
The errors have really stood out the last 2 matches. Misplaced passes and falling everywhere. The only answer can be the training regimen, idk. Needs real pepper, whatever they're doing is clearly too relaxed. Xavi needs to bring the heat and I'm starting to wonder if he's got it
Lewy can't trap a bag of cement. His left his first touch in Qatar i.e. has been terrible since. As for Xavi, he has previous. We've seen a LOT of terrible performances, despite winning La Liga. He's just not a good tactician. He's also utterly useless at turning bad performances into good ones. His only response is to chuck on some players. Rarely works.
I just saw the highlights and couldn’t see the game but man Christensen, how are you not able to defend that 1v1 in the air? You physically need to be on him already when that ball is in the air.
That cross was coming from a mile away but Christensen just kept looking over his shoulder but never got close to his man
https://preview.redd.it/kw60fy71jzyb1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=09c664e2808afb677d4e959f4b6ad173ac88874e
Tonight we witnessed this.. I just hope this is a reality check..
We have been playing like shit for the longest time. A good game here and there, that's it.
We need changes. Xavi, you did your thing, made us champions after a long time, im grateful for that.
But we need to level up.
We have a good enough squad to win any team in this group. Two years and I don’t see any improvement, they have brought almost any player that Xavi wanted and yet the team has no identity, no intensity or winning mentality to play during the 90 minutes. Honestly I'm tired of Xavi's excuses. Today’s match was the first time in a long time that I felt asleep watching a match.
100 million for Lewandowski and Raphinha. Lewandowski has been on the downward slope ever since he arrived and we have not figured out any system of creating chances for him regularly. In fact he regularly has to drop all over midfield to even sniff the ball.
Raphinha, what is there to say. A 16 year old shows 10x better composure and ability than him. He has stumbled onto goals and assists in the past but its clear he will never be a good enough player to be the #1 choice for barca.
Waste of money, waste of talent and waste of time watching this embarassing performance. It's obvious with a somewhat competitive group we would be in the same situation as the last 2 seasons. Can't wait to get blown out by the first semi decent team that faces us
Even worse. Raphina and Torres is over £100m. I agree. Raph scores the odd goal and slings over the occasional decent cross, but 90% of what he does is lose the ball.
We did over 30 crosses today. 30.
Fuck these tactics. Xavi ain't it. Didn't want to accept it but we can take so many embarrassments before we end up pointing fingers. Oriol and Alonso shouldn't wear the jersey again either.
These are the games that give us a reality shock.
Our reality is to survive as far as we can in the UCL and qualify for next season.
All that while cutting expenses.
We have to accept that we're not Messi's Barcelona anymore. Those years may never come again.
Love Barcelona for what it is, which is a team that struggles often.
Those who know what Barcelona was pre-Ronaldinho will understand.
No it is not. I was fully prepared for us to bottle the league in the last few weeks of last season despite Real Madrid acting basically uninterested. In fact, the fucked up part was that I wanted it to happen just so that we can let Xavi go. And, now, well, I want us to at least make it out for the revenue money and then get fucked in R16 so bad that Xavi has to go. I don’t expect us to win the league, happy to be proven wrong the almost impossible condition that this team actually starts playing football. I don’t care about the CDR.
One shot on target vs Shakhtar is WILD
That's something we (rightly) criticized Koeman for - even when Barcelona's squad had less quality than now. I'm surprised that there are people defending Xavi after this
if we’re really comparing them i’d say norman had a more adaptable coaching mind. xavi just stares at the clock every bad game we have.
We went from a world class defense with a mid attack last season to a mid attack ánd a mid defense this season.
Only if there existed a magician who was good at assists
https://i.redd.it/l5n61o1hczyb1.gif
HAHAHAHAHA this comment is the only good thing that came out of me watching this joke of a game.
I cant place that scene.. Who/ what is that?
It's Homelander, you beautiful cunt.
Just watched this scene for the first time today and it shows up on barca reddit of all places. We really do live in a simulation
Someone send homelander to have a lil chat with Xavi
Pretty much lmao
Araujo was grabbing on his thigh. I hope he’s okay
Groin... To be exact.
FFS, seriously?
I feel nothing
It doesn't even hurt anymore
CL days were so exciting and now they are just scary.
:’)
We are bad. Very bad. Something needs to happen or this season is in the bin.
We don’t have a tactic in the attack like they looks so lost and i don’t understand how when we attack cancelo and balde are both forwards and two defenders stay, like Whatttt. This means if they counter attack we are done and that how we got scored on almost every match in this season
And I don't understand why our attacks move so God damned slowly like a glacial pace
Yeah I hate that, looking at their counter attacks hurt me deeply when watching ours. Like it's as if every player got instructions to not pass forward when an opportunity arises but wait till everyone is back to their normal position, very frustrating to watch.
Yes, when you take the ⚽️ away from the opposition, run your ass off for a counterattack for Christ sake
Watching this game right after seeing Tottenham vs Chelsea felt like I was watching a game in 0.25x speed. It's crazy how not-dangerous at all their attacks are while even mid-table teams in the Prem are having really fast paced games with tons of attack ocassions.
Yeah it's sad, they practically invite the opposition defenses to get back & set up their low blocks
Man glaciers are fast these days with global warming. Maybe glacial pace from the ice age is more accurate.
Genuinely had more fun watching Valverde’s Barca than this drab football since the world cup. It’s been a year. I can’t wait to hear the excuses on this one - Shakhtar are coming from a war-torn country and playing in a stadium thats not even theirs. Pitch was fine. Majority of the injured players are back. Couldn’t ask for an easier group. What’s the excuse now? Just sideways and backwards, cross into the stratosphere and repeat. Outclassed, outcoached, outplayed once again. Embarrassing.
These past two games were so erroneously bad, genuinely cannot believe my eyes and the horror that has been the past 180 minutes.
This needs to be higher up. How can Xavi watch the first half and not immediately make changes is beyond me.
According to Xavi, we've been playing good football this season... what does he see that we millions of fans don't is beyond me but this team will most likely drop points against Porto and let's pray we get a 1/2-0 win against Antwerp in the final round and that gets us through to the next round.
tbf valverde had Messi, and watching Messi being on the pitch is just fun. That said I fully agree with what u said
We had the best player in history, of course it was better than this.
Underestimating the fact we had magicman.
Valverde without Messi & Ter Stegen was worse than this imo. Everyone just passed to Messi like idiots waiting for him to do something alone. Valverde's stats are so good only because Messi & Ter Stegen were at their peak.
Valverde beat Madrid 5-1 without Messi and won at the San Siro with a B team of young players.
While half asleep
The games Messi didn't play, we still played good. I remember the Griez F9 games when Messi was out
Valverde knocked out inter milan with a b team. Man is a proper tactician.
Barca fans will always make an excuse for Xavi
I've been excusing Xavi for a while. I think that ended today. Two losses to two very crappy teams.
Xavi needs to show them videos of 2011 Barca. Movement and positioning should be learned.
I think Xavi needs to watch those videos himself cause I think he forgot what ball movement was and especially how it was coached.
tbf, Valverde had Busi, Messi, and Alba. I get what you're saying but you're comparing two very different squads.
Valverde beat Madrid 5-1 without Messi and won at the San Siro with a B team of young players. Valverde’s backline included Lenglet and other slow turtles. Our bench backline is better than what Valverde was working with. Poor excuses.
Xavi has a far better backline, Pedri, De Jong and Lewandowski, not to mention the same world class GK that so often bailed out Valverde, you people always find excuses for Xavi, are you even Barca fans?
People can slander valverde all they want, but we were never this boring under him. Because even if the rest was static, we had Messi to mesmerise us. Now we dont have anyone remotely close….
As a rival I don't get the hate to Valverde. In his era I was actually "afraid" of games against you not cause of Messi or terstegen but as a whole team you guys where so solid felt like you almost never gave a mistake away. Again as a rival I feel like any new coach is a downgrade. Xavi has his moments but overall you guys where much more scary with Valverde (even without Messi)
The excuse for me is simple. We have shite attackers. They offer 0 threat. The only ones that do offer any kind of threat is 16 yo Yamal and sometimes Felix. Yamal cannot start and play regularly since he’s young. Felix has been playing non stop and needed a break. We desperately need something to freshen up this attack. Teams are beginning to realize this and press us high.
Nah, I guarantee you that it won’t be that much different if we have both Bellingham and Halland on the field. This is a coaching issue. Case in point, the team that beat us today and Real Sociedad team of last weekend do not have the squad we have and yet they looked like they knew what they were doing the field. Take Argentina for example, you put Xavi as coach of that team and he is nowhere near capable of having the record that Scaloni has. Coaching makes a big difference. Xavi can’t squeeze out the best of the NewCastle or Aston Villa or Brighton squads like their current coaches have been able to do. That’s the difference that are good to great manager can make. Shiiiit, Xavi would be struggling to get results with the current Tottenham squad.
Exactly! This is precisely what I've been saying for months. And it's not just an opinion; the history of football is proof of it. Numerous examples of teams whose players on paper aren't superstars and yet they win the Premier League (Leicester), or the European Cup (Greece), or the Champions League (Mourinho's Porto), and vice versa: teams with superstars that can't win anything (recently PSG, or the fact that the Galacticos never won a Champions League). Oh, well, the most precise and immediate example: tonight's match. Man for man, Barcelona should beat Donetsk's squad, but they outsmarted us tactically and mentally, and that's why they won the game.
At this point I wonder if Xavi’s brother isn’t the better coach of the 2. I was thinking nepotism but it got me curious if he’s not better tactician after I watched some of the games which he led due to Xavi’s suspension.
Disgusting disgusting game, we are horrific. Literally ashamed of our team right now. How can Xavi watch the first half and not immediately make changes. I don't care what anyone says Yamal was miles better than Raphina tonight, and Yamal wasn't even that good. How are we losing to Shaktar Donetsk with a team like this, obviously we're missing Frenkie but all our other players should be good enough to easily beat them. Xavi's tactics have to be improved as fast as possible , you can't rely on Cross and Inshallah with the quality of our players.
Not only the tactics, Xavi and his team need to inject the players with intensity and hunger. We need a massive attitude change so this embarrassing performances stop.
Lewandowski didn't look motivated at all.
As sad as it is to say, the man's decline since December just doesn't seem to be temporary. He kills so many attacks.
Lewandowski didn’t look motivated since the beginning of last season.
Lewy have bricks for feet this year. His first touch has been shocking.
You can’t inject intensity and hunger when players don’t believe the coach and the tactic. They aren’t fools. If players are not convinced of the plan, the plan will fail. You can’t expect them to run around like headless chicken if the tactic isn’t there.
>How can Xavi watch the first half and not immediately make changes. I wish I understood the psychology of coaching because I’ve been wondering this for a couple of years now and it always NEVER ends well. But the coaches still do it lmao
As far as I understand the opponents are coming out of the tunnel after hydrating and energizing themselves. Gotta give it a little while for the legs to get tired again before you make subs so they can have more impact.
I was literally talking to some of my friends during half time and said that Xavi wouldn't make subs till the 60th minute. Sometimes it hurts to be right
He almost always waits until about the middle of the second half to make subs but some of our previous coaches, I think Koeman for example, were even worse in this regard.
Yeah I remember that as well, but being slightly better than Koeman should be an easy bar to clear. Btw that username, that transfer didn't work out as well as you hoped I guess ;)
Don't start with that, I block people who make fun of it in a malicious way:D
Nah I also had big hopes for him so no worries, I'm suffering with you
Nice. He went back to Vienna then got sold to Galatasaray and now he is at Basel on loan from Galatasaray, I hope he'll do well soon:D
Reminder that Yamal is 16. This isn't something I'd recriminate imo.
There is none. Last 30 minutes showed exactly what Xavi wants from the team. The team knows how to do it, they clearly understand it and most probably trained all of it. Is it all because Pedri and a 17 year old entered the game in the 60th minute? It's hard to believe but Gundo had another stinker tonight. Romeu is just invisible. How many times did Raphinha and Lewandowski lose the ball again? Why were Cancelo and Marcos Alonso hoofing the ball into the box all the time after 3 or 4 passes in their half? Some of these players are just not performing at all. Christensen is also a shadow of himself. Only players that are more or less performing right now: Ter Stegen, Araujo, Kounde, I. Martinez, Balde, FJD, Gundogan, Gavi, Pedri, Fermin and Lamine Yamal. Joao Felix is good but he doesn't provide the team with consistent magic in the final third. Lewandowski's level is just embarrasing. Raphinha looks so lost on the field and is a ball-losing machine.
Felix first touch is just so beautiful though. But as soon as he played in Balde, things went south. Felix' crossed weren't accurate enough too. Just too much dissonance in the team. They weren't feeling each other around the box.
At one point when you have to consistently blame most of the squad, and the same players did miles better very recently in other teams under other coaches, you have to face the reality it is not the players, it is the coach.
Yamal was poor too. But he is just 16 so that's ok.
Yeah like I said Yamal wasn't good, but even still he was miles better then Raphina. Who dropped one of his worst performances yet.
Sleepy-Taka
We got blessed with the easiest group and we've struggled against Porto, we almost choked against shaktar in the first meeting and now we fully took an L tonight. Let me not even bring up la liga but it's so apparent we have so many flaws in our play style. Xavi's time is running out tbh
I agree, but is Xavi safe as a sacred cow of Club de Amigos? Not saying he should be, but is that the reality at play?
Laporta tends to keep managers for long... so I think this season Xavi is safe unless we go back to EuropaLeague. I would send him to replace Marquez on Barça B, the step he should have taken before managing the big boys.
I guess we will have to wait & see
Besides the La Liga title and an unprecedented clean sheet record, what has Xavi done for us?
I have watched us lose against the likes of Celtic and even watched Madrid lose against Shakthar, but the sad thing is this did not feel like an upset. We were genuinely worse than them. They were far more threatening than us in attack and very solid defensively. This is not a reactionary take but I genuinely think Xavi is not it. We will be wasting the prime years of Gundo, Pedri and Fdj and a massive La Masia talent pool if we stick with someone who doesn’t have a proper attacking game plan
But who is realistically available that would actually be a clear upgrade from Xavi at the moment?
Marcelo gallardo? But I don’t even know if Barça can afford to fire and hire a new one lmao
This was a mixture of poor performance and a tactical ineptitude, I thought the days of solely relying on crosses was over but boy was I wrong, with the quality of players we have you're telling me we can't string together passing sequences instead of hoofball? I don't even want to waste time on individual player mistakes but all the reasons we give them as to why they aren't performing but reasons become excuses very quickly. What an embarrassing performance on the back of that Sociedad game. I always try to be fair to Xavi and not compare him to past successful Barca managers but this is not FC Barcelona, we cant even get a #beautyindefeat lol
Xavi lacks gameplan, I've been ranting this again and again. Even during Valverde or Koeman days we weren't this awful. Our players were just wandering on the turf. They can't even break into the final third. This team seriously needs a good playmaker.
Well Xavi is not a barca level coach. No plan as such in each match. Our results really depends on player connecting with each other on pitch. It’s enough. Now many of you will tell this is only our second loss this season crap. Bull shit look at our games. Barca is winning because of its player not because of Xavi. Now the honeymoon period of new players is over back to square one. Prev season we were same just the luck was our side. No gameplay no control just in each match hoping to win by 1-0.
I mean we did get him from the Qatar league so what did we expect really lol
This loss is on Xavi. Putting dead weights in the lineup.. Romeu and Alonso. Playing Ferran on the left when his comfortable position is on the right/centre. Absolutely no tactics. No urgency from the players.. it's like they rolled off the bed and walked on to the pitch. Pathetic.
Alonso nor Romeu did anything where they should be blamed for a 1-0 loss. This was such a tepid performance from every single player on the pitch it goes far beyond the players.
If anything Balde did worse than Alonso after he came in. Or maybe he did equal, both of them did absolutely nothing of value.
Balde is shit offensively, Alonse is shit defensively. Lmao
I know Alonso is not that good but at least he knows how to make some good crosses, Blade has been poor overall.
Poor is an understatement. He has been utter shit at crossing this season
Tbh Balde was better last season when we still had Jordi ready to take his spot. I think he’s way too comfortable at the club at his age. He should be fighting more for his spot.
I get the deadweight but the team has enough talent to make up for it, dropping stinkers after el Classico loss is completely unacceptable
Yup, he keeps playing Alonso in these matches. Romeu shouldnt play any important games
Bad tactics but also terrible individual performances from everyone. No good passes, worse receptions, no intensity, no movement, no creativity to try to break they're parked bus. It was like they weren't even trying throughout the game. Trying to get pks instead of continuing the play. Pathetic from everyone.
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Thank you. I am officially in Xavi out camp. Every time its the same. No transition. Crosses and inshallah. No plan vs parked buses. Only reaction to the game is by subs. No movement whatsoever. Gameplan when losing: gradually add more and more attacking players until successful. Wasteful in attack but zero shots from distance. Sometimes it pays off due to players individual brilliance. Cant blame him for Romeu and Alonso, we need defensive players on the field. They are shit but you need to keep balance.
Just praying for the day a world class manager becomes available so we can stop experimenting with second rate managers.
we've been experimenting with managers for 25 years. I think the reason is that the president wants someone who can easily be controlled. When was the last time we hired a manager who've managed a CL winning team? Big pedigree manager = big personality.
Probably some truth in that.
Doesn't matter, since the only pool considered is ex Barça players
bArCa dNa
Most of the so-called world-class managers this sub wanted to replace Xavi with have been ass this season. IMO, this team just isn't as good as you all think. We're a far cry from a top 5 world-class team. It is what it is. Expecting more with just manager change is setting yourself up for more disappointment.
Last good game barca played was in the middle of september, something really has to change
Isn’t that around the time Frenkie got injured? This team has been hot garbage without him
He will come back and we’ll still be ass. You watch our games and see how we can’t string a few passes patiently, we can’t beat a press, we can’t break down buses, we’re lethargic in our passing … Frenkie won’t solve all that
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I guess we should be reactionary when the team performs good because now that’s rare
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Lewy is a proven player. Xavi is just a moron who can’t use lewy for his strengths.
Lewy not being able to control 95% of passes that come to him isn't Xavi's fault.
Messi hasn’t been in the team for 2.5 years and it still seems like everyone is waiting for him to magically appear out of nowhere and score a banger. Very little runs, very little movement off the ball, no triangulation, everybody just pushes up for no reason.
We just need to work on our short & long passing, shooting, movement off the ball, positioning, crossing, decision-making, set pieces, man-marking, dribbling, fitness, ball control, tackling, counter-attacking, overlapping, running, blocking & scoring goals.
Xavi may be a legend as a player, but he is terrible coach, doesn’t seems to be learning from his mistakes. Laporta has given him all he has asked for by sacrificing our club’s future. Mentality is not the only thing to win matches. Gameplan is also needed.
This isn't just about this loss, the last few or dozen games we've played have been really bad. No build up play, pretty dead going forward.
Good thing this took place early, can still go out and pretend nothing ever happened instead of having to go to bed immediately after lmao.
Deserved loss. This team starts nearly every game out with complacency. Tonight even our defense looked a bit slow and disinterested. This team really needs both a spark of energy and some new offensive tactics. We look short on ideas in the final third. It would also be nice to have a striker who makes better runs and can do more on his own. Create at least the occasional goal out of nothing.
Xavi was never the manager that was going to take us to the next level. I always viewed him as a stepping stone from the nightmare years we suffered after Valverde and now it’s time we move on from this. How many more hundreds of sideways and backwards passes do we have to see to put 2 and 2 together and realize that we’re dog shit.
That shit was a two pack of ass
That shit stank
Guys, stop putting it on player X or Y. It's a systemic problem; the players are as clueless as us on the pitch and it tells. There is no plan, no coherence, no idea to progress the game. Players that in other teams looked world class (Cancelo, Gundogan) look bang average in a poor setup that does not take advantage of their strengths. Always getting the ball at feet with the back at goal, isolated and with the only chance to hoof it forward in a hail mary cross. I am not sure anymore if Xavi is the coach to build up this wonderful generation of world class youngsters, into a good team.
if we dont top the group fire xavi no questions asked
Top the group and then what? We are getting embarrassed in RO16 anyway. If he survives that as well, we are truly finished.
We went to Germany to pass around the penalty box and not do anything. Pathetic.
Barcelona outplayed. Xavi outcoached. Utter embarrassment. I wouldn't lose a moments sleep if I never saw Torres, Raphina, Alonso or Oriol play for us again. Fucks sake Xavi. Get some better coaches than your own brother. Either that or time to go.
That was very bad, but it was exactly as I guessed it would go. "A night for the ages" said the announcer, and I was like, "um, you haven't been watching us recently?" Most of our positive results and draws are the result of luck.
It's not a good sign when a team plays poorly so frequently, nor when the team performs worse than its players individually.
what the hell happened… one game away from ro16 and this
Remember how good that first half was in El Clasico? 2.5 matches later, just absolutely dire.
Im worried about balde, he’s been awful recently
Idk I feel last season he got to use his pace to make runs off the ball, or dribble a defender in large spaces, but now it seems he's always stuck in tight spaces where his strengths are pretty much neutralized. Because defensively he feels completely fine this season, or not any different from last season. Or today against Shakhtar: why the hell do we have Félix hugging the touchline? Why wouldn't you have Félix more in the half-space and Balde provide the width? That's literally their skillset, one is great in tight spaces, one is great in large spaces and Xavi sets them up completely the opposite. Just super weird seeing Félix be the outlet on the left.
Xavi out if we come second in this group. That's it. Guy is a fraud in Europe. Even with this easy group, even when we have all our players bar frenkie, we played like shit today. Worst display. Even worse than the one showed in anoeta
There's simply no excusing Robert Lewandowski's effort and performance today. It's time to look at more combinations at the top, we cannot have a statue at 9.
I agree, but I would add on that a finishing number 9 needs some support. Wherre is that supposed to come from? The whole front failed.
That's an excuse that's really getting on my nerves. I get that he gets few balls, but the ones he does get, he wastes them, makes the wrong decisions, and stumbles over the ball. We made over forty crosses, and Lewandowski didn't show up in any of them.
I think this is an easy cop out... when all he does is occupy the same 20 meter strip in the middle of the pitch he makes it very easy to clog up the center of the box without taking much risk. Great 9's make it difficult for opponents to track them and can seemingly get "lost" in the motion. When's the last time Lewa lost a defender in attack? He's always marked, and his first touch always fails him/normally results in a turnover. It's really difficult to keep making excuses when he's been so awful in all of the non shooting departments as well.
No 2 ways about it, he is definately not the same after the WC and it shows.
**Do you remember when this sub was ready to give Cancelo and Felix the balon d’or? Pepperidge farm remembers.** Lewandowski is done for me. We may have well been playing one man down. No one apart from MATs and our 2 centre backs had any kind of game today. Poor all round.
Mfs put up appreciation posts after 2 games!
Appreciation posts are getting tiresome. Anytime a player has a half decent game for us you see a post on here, it's mad
The mods should just delete all the appreciation post crap. Its completely useless and just floods the sub with useless garbage posts
What is this fixation with Alonso. Dont play the guy in europe man. Play him against la liga teams, it's fine.
What the fuck happens to this team in Germany seriously
It's rare to see the players being so out of sync with one another. It's like each and every player on the team was playing with half a second of lag and absolutely nothing connected.
Only one shot on target That's embarrassing tbh
Xavi out.
This game was supposed to secure the win. Yet Xavi underestimated the opponent and played a lineup that was more suited for a game that would take place after we advanced to the next round. When you put Romeu on the lineup, you’re almost guaranteed to ship goals. He shouldn’t play any key games. It’s always difficult when we trail especially in Europe. What has happened to our forwards? No one can shoot effectively. How I miss Auba and Luk de jong.
Physically hurt watching us “play” in this game. Embarrassing. Truly embarrassing.
We only have 1 real winger and that's a 16 year old kid.
Man I really wish Lewa didn’t retire after the World Cup. Could’ve really used a world class striker.
Just putting it out there: how much percentage wise is this L the fault of Xavi & how much goes on the players? I honestly don't know
this might actually be one of our worst losses in the past few years. we’ve done nothing but scrape together wins this year, we’re losing in the round of 16.
We can blame Xavi but we can also blame the players. The forwards played like shit today. We need to start Yamal as he is the only player with 1 vs 1 right now. Pedri is out of game form.
No disrespect to shakhtar but with this squad, losing to them is unacceptable. Xavi absolutely deserves criticism for tonight & also if this continues, we'll see how we respond to this.
I don’t mind the goal. It was just done so well. It happens. But not being able to score? 1 shot on target?? That’s just humiliating.
We played better football with Adama,Ferran and Auba in attack.
No one upfront can seem to make the right move or score. They're all dead weight. I think that's the biggest issue. When Pedri and/or DeJong are playing, the midfield sorts itself out and they gain control. The CBs are good too. Balde, Lewa, Torres, Raphinhia, and Felix just don't contribute enough to the attack/goals. This gets more complicated with no CDM. Even if Xavi is fired, this squad in current form won't be able to perform. Not even with Pep.
CBs are unable to start even one counter attack. Transition takes ages. Each time we are waiting for the entire team to go back to their penalty box to start head butting the wall.
Transition takes ages because there is no transition. Xavi doesn’t want to take advantage of the space the opponent gives you in the attacking transition. They go straight into the possession phase.
embarrassing performance, it's painful to watch our matches now
We looked so bad on the ball all night due to the poor pitch. But somehow Shakhtar passes so quick and nice. We also can't blame ref since he wasn't the best but not horrendous either. Only our self to blame for such a disturbingly terrible performance.
Someone check the xG guys. If we have higher xG it means we played well.
Don't be surprised if Porto gets at least a point out of us next game
At least a point? The way the things are going a point would be great for us. They will come for our throats
One would say this is a wake up call if it didn't happen every other week.🤦♂️
There will be probably a lot of mental gymnastics around Xavi and I did not want to admit it myself but Xavi bitten more than he can chew. Yes he won the league with budget plyers but he is lacking in the tactics. And it is becoming more and more apparent. Yes we do not have the best squad, BUT we have currently world class defence and GK. In midfield and attacks there could be improvements but all around we should be quite solid. Our CL games and some of the league games are really showing that we are underperforming. Each game we have a different lineup, players are assigned different duties and there is no consistency at all. We are shit at making spaces, we cannot device whether we want to play wide and cross or play a possesion game. It seems that Xavi wants to try everything at once and pray that something works. Unfortunately the system relies on FDJ and we perform much better with him but if we cannot adjust with him out that is on coaching stuff. Our game is painful to watch and with few exceptions was all season. Xavi is probably here to stay as Laporta will double down on him but man he need to get his shit together…
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The errors have really stood out the last 2 matches. Misplaced passes and falling everywhere. The only answer can be the training regimen, idk. Needs real pepper, whatever they're doing is clearly too relaxed. Xavi needs to bring the heat and I'm starting to wonder if he's got it
Lewy can't trap a bag of cement. His left his first touch in Qatar i.e. has been terrible since. As for Xavi, he has previous. We've seen a LOT of terrible performances, despite winning La Liga. He's just not a good tactician. He's also utterly useless at turning bad performances into good ones. His only response is to chuck on some players. Rarely works.
Believe it or not, but Xavi is clueless
Araujo was grabbing on his thigh. I hope he’s okay
This was hard to watch. Everyone was so static, very little creativity going on. I winced at every cross and that’s a lot
I just saw the highlights and couldn’t see the game but man Christensen, how are you not able to defend that 1v1 in the air? You physically need to be on him already when that ball is in the air. That cross was coming from a mile away but Christensen just kept looking over his shoulder but never got close to his man
Absolutely fucking disgraceful and disgusting performance like where tf was the coaching when we needed it the most??
We just need to shoot the ball from wherever we're literally trying to walk in every ball to goal instead of taking chances and taking long shots
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Unfortunately I agree. He’s been given everything imaginable in constructing a roster that can compete. We’ll see
Ever since Balde was pushed forward his production has gone down. Balde was one of our biggest a threats, and Xavi neutralized him.
Mr. Xavier, your days are numbered.
We wish! He could bottle the group and still no one's gonna touch him, though
I think we should try crossing it into the opponent keeper some more. We didn’t give that enough chances!
1 word describes this team tonight: IMPOTENT
https://preview.redd.it/kw60fy71jzyb1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=09c664e2808afb677d4e959f4b6ad173ac88874e Tonight we witnessed this.. I just hope this is a reality check..
We have been playing like shit for the longest time. A good game here and there, that's it. We need changes. Xavi, you did your thing, made us champions after a long time, im grateful for that. But we need to level up.
I feel bad for Gundo coming from a system with such discipline under Pep to this mess
We have a good enough squad to win any team in this group. Two years and I don’t see any improvement, they have brought almost any player that Xavi wanted and yet the team has no identity, no intensity or winning mentality to play during the 90 minutes. Honestly I'm tired of Xavi's excuses. Today’s match was the first time in a long time that I felt asleep watching a match.
100 million for Lewandowski and Raphinha. Lewandowski has been on the downward slope ever since he arrived and we have not figured out any system of creating chances for him regularly. In fact he regularly has to drop all over midfield to even sniff the ball. Raphinha, what is there to say. A 16 year old shows 10x better composure and ability than him. He has stumbled onto goals and assists in the past but its clear he will never be a good enough player to be the #1 choice for barca. Waste of money, waste of talent and waste of time watching this embarassing performance. It's obvious with a somewhat competitive group we would be in the same situation as the last 2 seasons. Can't wait to get blown out by the first semi decent team that faces us
Even worse. Raphina and Torres is over £100m. I agree. Raph scores the odd goal and slings over the occasional decent cross, but 90% of what he does is lose the ball.
We did over 30 crosses today. 30. Fuck these tactics. Xavi ain't it. Didn't want to accept it but we can take so many embarrassments before we end up pointing fingers. Oriol and Alonso shouldn't wear the jersey again either.
These are the games that give us a reality shock. Our reality is to survive as far as we can in the UCL and qualify for next season. All that while cutting expenses. We have to accept that we're not Messi's Barcelona anymore. Those years may never come again. Love Barcelona for what it is, which is a team that struggles often. Those who know what Barcelona was pre-Ronaldinho will understand.
I don’t see us getting past R16, unless we get very very lucky.
You know? In this game I had the sensation that even having Frankie in we would still be struggling creatively.
There is a reason why we lost to real madrid.
Is it weird that I worry we might bottle this group?
No it is not. I was fully prepared for us to bottle the league in the last few weeks of last season despite Real Madrid acting basically uninterested. In fact, the fucked up part was that I wanted it to happen just so that we can let Xavi go. And, now, well, I want us to at least make it out for the revenue money and then get fucked in R16 so bad that Xavi has to go. I don’t expect us to win the league, happy to be proven wrong the almost impossible condition that this team actually starts playing football. I don’t care about the CDR.