Barcelona on the brink of disaster again, Xavi’s record in the Premier League is an exclamation point. Will he fall back into the Europa League?

In the summer, Barcelona sold off half the club to bring in expensive reinforcements. It was expected to duke it out with Bayern for top spot in the Champions League group, but now it looks like it will be fighting Inter to advance at all.

Last year’s black nightmare, when Barcelona already dropped out of the Champions League group (Bayern, Benfica, Dynamo Kiev) and wandered into the Europa League, is still vividly remembered in Catalonia. And they thought it would never happen again.

But one year has come and gone and Barcelona have to call off another blunder. For after the 4-1 win against Plzen came defeats to Bayern and Inter, and the Blaugranas are once again on the edge of the precipice. After three games they have three points and are playing with fire.

The rematch with Inter Milan is scheduled for next week and could practically decide everything. If Inter beats Barcelona again, they will already be assured of promotion, even if they lose their next two games against Bayern and Plzeň.

In that case they would have 9 points, Barcelona 3. If it beats both Pilsen and Bayern, it would have the same number of points, but a worse match against the Milanese side.

But even if there is a draw, it is uncomfortable for Barcelona. If we count on both teams beating Plzen, the Catalans would not be helped by a win over Bayern and an Inter loss to their Munich rival, at which point they would again have the same points and Inter would have a better mutual match.

Thus, if a draw were to be born at Camp Nou, Barcelona would have to win both remaining games and hope that Inter don’t beat Plzen on their own ground.

With Barcelona winning by one goal and picking up the same number of points, the score would then matter. Either way, these are not exactly positive prospects for the Culés.

Xavi’s poor record

Especially considering how well Xavi has (not) fared in the Champions League. The Barcelona coach has coached 5 games in the most prestigious competition and lost 3 of them. He only managed to beat Viktoria Plzen and drew with Benfica Lisbon. He lost twice to Bayern and once to Inter.

However, Xavi did not improve his record in the Europa League either. In fact, he played 11 cup matches and won only 3 times. He only beat Pilsen, Napoli and Galatasaray. The draws came against Benfica, Napoli, Galatasaray and Frankfurt, while the defeats came against Bayern (twice), Inter and Frankfurt.

After a summer of super-strengthening, when Barcelona brought in Lewandowski, Raphinha, Koundé, Kessie, Christensen, Bellerin and Alonso, they were expected to return to the top. Dropping out of the Champions League group would have been a huge blunder that would have hugely undermined Xavi’s confidence.

Source: UEFA, Barcelona, Champions League