Absence Of Xavi Hernandez No Reason For Barcelona To Disappoint - Barca Blaugranes

You can tell your team is good when a score-draw at the Santiago Bernabeu isn't a good result. Yes, Barcelona didn't really play very well in the first leg of the Clasico SuperCopa, but they still emerged with a 2-2 draw, which isn't too bad at all. Adi-Oula Sebastian of Barca Balugranes wasn't impressed, however, and while it's tempting to peg the indifferent display on the absence of Xavi, he doesn't think that's reasonable either:

Taking all into account, the 2-2 draw past Sunday was perhaps the worst Clasico performance by FC Barcelona in the Pep Guardiola era. Frankly, I still can’t identify a positive in Barca’s woeful display. To many fans the explanation was as obvious as it is simple, FC Barcelona were missing Xavi. While there might be some merit to this suspicion, as wonderful a football player he is, he is still just a single player in a collective of many. It’s a weak argument. In my mind no one should be irreplaceable, especially not in a team sport. I refuse to accept Xavi’s absence as an explanation for an abysmal display. If all it takes to derail FC Barcelona, a team considered being one the best of all-time, is the nonappearance of Xavi – then I guess the plaudits are unwarranted.

Sebastian goes on to highlight the state of the central defence as a reason that Barcelona had trouble against Madrid in the first leg, but one suspects that the midfield might be more problematic. Several experts have noted that Barcelona's typically excellent pressing wasn't all there, and that sounds more like a fitness thing than anything else. Either way, it doesn't really matter - by the time important games start, you'd probably expect Pep Guardiola's side to be at the top of their game.