The Royal Spanish Academy defines 'order' as "placing things in their rightful place." The term is relevant because it seems the key to Barça happiness. “We have been in disarray in the last two games, we have played badly and we have to accept the criticism,” Xavi Hernández defended this Saturday, remembering the duels against Real Sociedad and Shakhtar, Barça being unrecognizable in both despite taking the victory in the first. A miracle, that of Araújo, which in a house as particular as Barcelona is not enough to hide what was a frankly bad game. A scenario that fueled the European defeat against the Ukrainians and that has put the Barça coach in the spotlight.
He looks at Xavi's intrigued surroundings, as if waiting for him to take out a magic wand and solve all football problems at once. Once the challenge was accepted by the one from Terrassa, order seems the only way to complete the trick. “It is the coach's time, but also the players' time to react and take a step forward,” he pointed out at a press conference. “Perhaps it is time to tweak some things, to propose variants, but we are not going to invent anything. We must be more faithful than ever to our identity, recover positional play and organize ourselves better on the field,” he explained without losing his calm.
No one knows better than Xavi the importance of changing this bad dynamic before the visit of Alavés, a team that still does not know whether to look up or down in the table, in the last match before the two-week break for matches. of selections. Furthermore, Girona's victory in Vallecas forces the Blaugrana even more, who will jump to the green of Montjuïc, seven points behind the surprising, but undisputed, leader of the First Division. “We have trained well and we have diagnosed what happened to us. It is a question of positioning on the field, we have to rescue it and, from there, recover sensations,” stressed Xavi, obsessed with order in the purest Sheldon Cooper style.
After seeing the fifth yellow in San Sebastián, Gavi will be a significant loss for Barça. Frenkie de Jong has not recovered in time either, although Xavi guaranteed his presence in the next matchday against Rayo (Saturday the 25th). On the other side of the scale we must place Pedri, who could return to the eleven. “He is one hundred percent,” his coach endorsed. Given the worrying lack of ideas in attack, Lamine Yamal has numbers to be another of the new starters. Everything to recover the lost order and, then, progress forward again.
FC Barcelona: Ter Stegen, Cancelo, Araújo, Inigo Martinez, Balde, Oriol Romeu, Gündogan, Pedri, Lamine Yamal, Lewandowski and João Felix.
Coach: Xavi Hernández.
Alavés: Sivera, Gorosabel, Abqar, Marín, Duarte, Blanco, Guevara, Rioja, Sola, Guridi, and Samu.
Coach: Luis García Plaza.
Referees: Mateo Busquets Ferrer (c. Majorcan).
Stadium: Montjuïc Olympic Stadium.
