Xavi Hernandez attended the press at the NEF Stadium before training at the Galatasaray stadium. The Barça coach made it clear that “I ask a lot of things from the team in this game, it’s a final, we can’t fail and we have to go out with more intensity than in the first leg. I didn’t like the first half, it wasn’t the game that needed to be played, then we didn’t get the chances right and all of that is what needs to be improved. The reference is what we did before Osasuna. We didn’t do our homework in the first leg and now we have a final, we have to win away from home, another qualification, in an environment like this. We have to try to do it again, as it happened to us in Naples”.
The Barça coach believes that “we will find ourselves in a match similar to the first leg, they defending, going against, we will try to find solutions to generate spaces and create chances. It’s another final and we face it with the utmost enthusiasm”. In that sense, he repeated that “I hope they take a similar approach to the Camp Nou, we must know how to attack, it will be a difficult game, we didn’t score a single goal there”. Xavi explained that “we have analyzed the first leg very well, to find out what happened to us, it was the merit of the Galatasaraywas very strong in defense and his goalkeeper very successful, but we will try to do better than in the first leg, we are self-critical and we did not have our best day”.
Facing the consequences of the match if they go to the quarterfinals or are eliminated, Xavi pointed out that “if you win you gain morale and confidence, if you lose the opposite”, and spoke of the atmosphere that they hope to find in the NEF Stadium of the Galatasaray: “They call it hell, we play on a difficult field, with other dimensions, the public will push harder and they will be more aggressive”.
Regarding the rotations in the first leg, he commented that “we knew the difficulty of the match, but Pique I had discomfort and Busquets the one that had played the most minutes was not due to underestimating the opposite. He has great players and a great coach who knows us well”.
Questioned about the importance of Sergio Busquets and the possibility that he will start in Turkey and in the Clásico, Xavi He commented that “for now we are focused only on tomorrow’s tie, I’m not thinking about anything else, there will be time to think about Sunday. Busi is essential, I’ve always said, there are few in the world who understand the game like him. And he is a leader, he brings a lot of things.”
“Our main objective is to return to the Champions League. Winning the Europa League would give us direct access and we would also add a title that would help the project”, he insisted Xavi. The coach admitted that “one of the things we want to improve is conceding fewer goals or defensive actions from set pieces, these are things that have to be done better to be a reliable team, we have to continue working on many aspects”.
“I take the pressure naturally, the players too. We didn’t get a good result in the first leg, but I see it as an opportunity, like the day of Naples. This is Europe and here they don’t give anything away,” he said. Xavi. Regarding the physical state of the squad, he commented that “the only thing that worries us is the inconvenience. We try to make a specific plan so that the players who play tomorrow recover and arrive on Sunday well”.
A Turkish journalist asked him at the end of the press conference what he will do Xavi if he falls before him Galatasaray and against Real Madrid on Sunday. The technician took it as a joke and said that “if that happens we will deal with it, but they are hypotheses, we will continue working the same”. He concluded the press conference by reiterating that “pressure is non-negotiable in my model, if a player does not press, he forces the team to run 70 meters backwards”.