“It’s my time.” Xavi has assumed it. He knows everyone is looking at him. Let the players look to him so that he can give them solutions as soon as possible. That Laporta watches it, who watched the defeat in Hamburg on TV from his home in Barcelona. Let “the environment” look at it, a term he dusted off a few weeks ago.
It is, without a doubt, the most critical moment of his time at Barça, superior to the disappointments he has experienced in the Champions League and the Europa League. The coach has only won seven of the 20 European games. Seven wins, seven defeats and six draws reveal the fragility of the Blaugrana, which is immersed in a vicious circle.
“We are blocked,” Xavi confessed using the first person plural. And what springs will the technician activate to perform that “reset” that the team needs so much? He must consider whether he returns to the classic 4-3-3 or strengthens, instead, his idea of the square, keeping the question of whether he maintains confidence in the group’s hierarchy.
It is up to the coach to manage the defeat. And it is not 1-2 for Madrid or 1-0 for Shakhtar but the defeat of not finding their football. He already made tough decisions, never seen before, such as making four changes at once in Hamburg when he was only an hour into the game. But then Xavi was not so forceful in the press room.
“We cannot allow confidence to be lost,” said Xavi, more of a psychologist than a coach. Closer to players who do not receive the tactical message with the clarity they need, confused and disoriented as everyone is during these dark days that have clouded Barça.
Time progresses, the team moves backwards and Xavi can’t find the right way. That’s why everyone looks at him. And many scrutinize it. The tone of his voice in Germany, muffled and subdued, revealed that he already knew.