Furious Xavi Scolded FC Barcelona At Half Time But His Two ‘Revolutions’ Didn’t Work Against Galatasaray

Xavi Hernandez’s triple substitution at half time during FC Barcelona’s 0-0 home draw to Galatasaray in the Europa League last 16 first leg was an indicator that all wasn’t well at Camo Nou.

FC Barcelona had their chances early on, which they failed to take with Ferran Torres particularly wasteful again. But they then took their foot off the gas and lost the intensity required to overcome a tough foe happy to play for the draw and take a clean slate back home to Turkey where Barca will now have to beat them in a hostile environment in order to advance the quarter-finals.

According to El Chiringuito, Xavi was furious with his charges during the interval and gave them an earful while accusing them of lacking the concentration and ambition that has in past weeks seen them enjoy their best moment of the season.

The coach tried to pull off two “revolutions” in total which failed to have an impact. First there was his tinkering with the line up, which some may have found unncessary considering that the Catalans were coming off a four-game winning streak heading into this one.

Sergino Dest, Eric Garcia, Nico Gonzalez, Adama Traore, Memphis Depay and Ferran Torres were six new names in the starting XI who didn’t feature from the get-go against Elche in La Liga at the weekend.

Collectively and individually, however, they made little impact with Nico, who was far too slow on the ball, hooked at half time before Depay, Ferran and Adama later followed him to the bench.

Xavi’s drastic triple substitution in bringing on Gerard Pique, Sergio Busquets and Ousmane Dembele brought a little more fluidity to Barca’s game. But still they didn’t seem close to scoring which pushed the tactician to introduce Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang for Memphis and Luuk de Jong at Adama’s expense.

At full time, Barca broke an unwanted record by going scoreless for the first time in 93 days and must now find the back of the net next Thursday unless they wish to keep a clean sheet and then head to a penalty shootout before a raucous crowd in Istanbul.