Barcelona striker Luis Suarez has confirmed that his team must "blame a lot" on himself, apologize for the performance after falling to Liverpool in a clean quarter-final in the Champions League semi-final and exit the European championship hands-free.
Al-Bursa dropped the continental championship in the aggregate of 4-3, after a 3-0 win at home last week and a 4-0 loss to Liverpool.
"You can not score two goals in one minute, and for the fourth goal, Barcelona looked like children ... we have to blame ourselves so much, we have to recognize the criticism that will come to us now and prepare to respond," Suarez said.
The Uruguayan international regretted the team falling in the same way for the second consecutive season.
Barcelona beat Roma 4-1 in last season's quarter-final at Camp Nou in Barcelona, but lost 3-0 in Rome.
"Liverpool did what they wanted, scored a very early goal, things were repeated and should not have been repeated," Suarez said. "Barcelona are in the elite teams and we should not have made the same mistake twice."
"We are mature players and we have fought the European championship for many years, and we have to review ourselves in the mistakes we make," he said, adding that what the team has done in this match calls for an apology.
Suarez defended his coach Ernesto Valverde, noting that "Valverde was congratulated after the first leg and should not be blamed now, because the players are the ones who came to the pitch."
"We are deeply saddened and deeply wounded. We are human beings who feel the pain and the tension we were in. We have to blame ourselves and open our chests to the criticism we will face."