Xavi Hernandez felt his FC Barcelona team was undeserving of losing to Real Madrid, who beat them 2-1 in El Clasico on Saturday. Barca took the lead early on through an Ilkay Gundogan goal, but Jude Bellingham, the man of the match, scored twice in the second half to put them ahead.
In an interview with the Spanish network that aired the match, the head coach of the Catalans stated that he thought his team dominated the opening sixty minutes. But as he pointed out, sometimes that’s simply the way football is—you don’t score a second goal to make it 2-0.
As Xavi described it, they only required two or two and a half opportunities to score two goals, whereas we needed five or six solid chances to score one. After Bellingham’s goal tied the score, he thought Madrid was satisfied and would have been happy to settle for a draw. However, Bellingham ended up winning via Marc-Andre Ter Stegen’s legs thanks to an unfortunate cross from Dani Carvajal.
In keeping with their sponsorship agreement with Spotify, Barcelona confirmed that they will wear shirts bearing the insignia of the iconic rock group The Rolling Stones during this month’s Clasico encounter versus Real Madrid.
Barcelona typically wears their jerseys with the Soundcloud emblem on the front as part of the agreement. They made a similar advertising attempt the previous season when they played Real Madrid wearing hip-hop artist Drake’s OVO logo. It has officially been announced that the iconic tongue and lips insignia of The Rolling Stones will be included on the team’s shirts for the October 28th game.
Even though Xavi was still hurt by the earlier outcome, which left him feeling bad, he thought the game was excellent and his team shouldn’t have lost. Xavi felt that Barcelona had done a great job of organizing and preparing for the game, but he also said that Madrid caused his team problems in the latter stages of the game.
Xavi Expresses’ Statement:
To be honest, Xavi stated, I believe we were the superior team. However, Madrid can win if you give them even a small advantage. He said, “Today we lost not because of the referee, but because we didn’t take our chances, and it was an unearned defeat.” They had discussed a penalty call in the dressing room.
In response to inquiries over his alleged angry exchange with Vinicius Jr., Xavi attempted to minimize any possible controversy. He clarified that, as always, he communicated his disagreement with a particular referee call to the Brazilian player, but he did so in a polite manner.
The former midfield player said it clearly: As a footballer, I admire and respect him.
Barcelona, now four points behind leaders Real Madrid and second-place Girona in the league, will try to go back to winning ways when they visit Real Sociedad in the Basque country the following weekend.
The Barcelona president, Joan Laporta, and his Sevilla counterpart, Pepe Castro, apparently had a heated phone conversation that ended suddenly four hours before the clubs were scheduled to play on September 29. Laporta had been told that, in protest of the ongoing developments in the Nigerian corruption investigation against Barcelona, the Sevilla leadership had decided not to watch the La Liga match from Barca’s executive box that day.
The Spanish public prosecutor’s office has been accusing Barcelona of corruption for more than six months. The claims are related to payments of €7.3 million that were purportedly made to Jose Maria Enriquez Nigeria, the vice president of Spain’s refereeing committee, between 2001 and 2018. Even though significant progress has been made recently, a resolution is yet to be made seven months later, and the subject is once again a hot topic in football boardrooms and conversations around the nation.
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