• 1-0 at Camp Nou Narration and statistics

  • Ilias Akhomach The 17-year-old pearl who surprised Xavi in ​​the first eleven

  • Classification Matchday 14

The night could only be close to ecstasy. To the fascination that mythomania forces. And also to delirium and anguish. Barcelona and Espanyol experienced a derby in which many of the suspicions were confirmed. Soccer, after the propaganda that surrounds it, tends to be too transparent. The Catalans won. But after the Blue and Whites, in a competitive nirvana in the second half, managed to lead them to extreme suffering.

Xavi Hernández

started his way on the Camp Nou bench forcing his players to regain self-esteem from the ball. But it remains too far from dominating the areas.

Mingueza

continues to

widen

the hole - this time the one who took him to the limit was Raúl de Tomás - and scoring goals is nothing short of an ordeal. Only the bad head of

Dimata

and a stick of

Raúl de Tomás

in the last frontier prevented Espanyol from catching something positive.

The Blue and Whites, like so many other times - there are already 14 consecutive defeats at the Camp Nou - found themselves with insurmountable walls. The main one, one's own fear. Vicente Moreno's approach in the first act, with a Numantine defense as the only response, led him to lose too much time, no matter how much De Tomás insisted on corrupting Barcelona's defensive fabric. Although behind that self-imposed wall was the referee's zeal, with Cabrera's penalty to

Memphis

as the determining point of the night. Nico, in the first half, had also rightly claimed a maximum penalty from

David López

. The Dutchman's goal was enough. And a blessing for this Barça in diapers.

The usual thing is to make our expectations our own.

Cling to them even if it is necessary to deform and even deny reality.

It is understandable.

This sport, especially at times when there are no games involved, has its main emotional motor in illusion.

Xavi Hernández spoke on the eve of the derby of a "restart" at Barcelona.

Now it will be necessary to see if football, which never had its best virtue in patience, will know how to wait.

Xavi celebrates Memphis 1-0 in the technical zone.

Vicente Moreno

, the Espanyol coach, was always characterized by applying common sense.

His bet at the Camp Nou will be criticized for an alleged lack of courage.

He pushed his team far behind.

So much so that the three centrals -David López was embedded between Cabrera and Sergi Gómez- had the breath of goalkeeper

Diego López

in the neck

.

Everything had to respond to an attempt by the blue and white coach to play with the Barça nervous system.

Old structural problems

After a first half hour in which Barcelona exhibited intensity in the robbery and a wide deployment by the interiors -

Nico

and

De Jong

-, old structural problems reappeared. This team is missing someone to crown creation. The goal is the forbidden fruit and

Memphis

, despite its constant offers, ended up trying to finish off its own centers.

There was still half an hour before the game began. The seats were beginning to take color and the footballers were striving to perform those warm-up exercises in which it is easy to see whether or not their faces reflect the tension of ecstatic nights. It was then that the name of the great protagonist emerged from the public address system. Of the new Barça pantocrator: Xavi Hernández. The Camp Nou rumbled with the uncontrollable anxiety of those who experience something for the first time.

The six years that Xavi spent in Qatar, first as a retired footballer, then as a new coach in an Al-Sadd turned laboratory of ideas, were far from forgotten.

Because while Barcelona was falling apart to the beat of Bartomeu's institutional delirium and with a Joan

Laporta

who opened his second stage closing the

Messi

era

, the longing for a past who knows if recoverable could only lead to the same figure.

Another 17 year old

Xavi has a blind faith in aspects that had been despised in recent times.

The ball is alpha and it is omega.

And young people are not a simple propaganda tool, but the reference of a project in which veterans (Piqué, Jordi Alba and Busquets) do not lose their status.

Who knows if with these pieces there will be a way to give continuity to the work of

Johan Cruyff

or

Pep Guardiola

.

Depay celebrates Barça's winning goal at the Camp Nou.EFE

Xavi, in his first line-up as Barcelona coach, started eight players raised in La Masia.

And before the hardships suffered by the team in attack, he looked down.

He needed two extremes.

The solution was to take

Gavi

, the best of Barcelona,

to the left bank

, and to the right the newcomer Ilias Akhomach.

Yes, another 17-year-old boy, this one born in Igualada.

After him came

Abde

, in whom Xavi found an agitator when Espanyol pressed the most.

It was the blue and white who monopolized the scene in a final stretch in which Barça fell apart badly.

Espanyol piled up as many forwards as they could.

And Barcelona, ​​with the ghostly

Coutinho

as evidence of this present, could not help but hold on to life.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

Know more

  • sports

  • soccer

  • First division

  • FC Barcelona

  • RCD Espanyol

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  • Sergio Busquets

  • Frenkie de Jong

LaLigaThe martyrdom of Koeman

LaLiga Xavi's challenges in a torn Barcelona

LaLigaThe keys to Xavi's return to Barça: delayed arrival, compressed salary and respect for Qatar

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