3 talking points from Barcelona’s Europa League exit

Another European night to forget for Xavi and his Barcelona side

Barcelona suffered yet another disappointing European night as the Catalan side lost 3-2 to Eintracht Frankfurt and were knocked out of the Europa League.

The visitors picked up where they left off in the first leg and were better than Barcelona on the night. They jumped out to an early lead and never looked back.

Barcelona were stymied throughout both matches and were unable to connect on a number of facets. They did manage to score twice in added time to make the loss respectable but it was a loss nonetheless.

Once again, a German team proved to be their undoing and it was another reality check as to where this Barcelona team is at the moment. While they have vastly improved since Xavi Hernandez took over, they are still a work in progress and the deficiencies evident in Europe under previous managers remain.

With all that being said, here are three takeaways from Barcelona’s elimination.

No lessons learned from the first leg

Despite being given a warning in Frankfurt, Barcelona were no better at home.

The play from the Blaugrana was sloppy at best and part of the blame was placed on the conditions of the pitch. This time they were playing at the Camp Nou and the result was no different.

Eintracht Frankfurt kept their defensive shape and closed nearly all the passing lanes when Barcelona were trying to play out from the back. This resulted in sloppy passes, bad giveaways or forcing Barcelona to play horizontally.

The visitors’ tactics bore fruit in the second goal in particular where the home side lost the ball in their half, resulting in the long-range effort from Rafael Borre.

The Barcelona boss was critical of his team in the post match press conference and referenced that they did not improve on what they needed to following the first leg.

“There were three things we needed to improve on from the first leg,” Xavi said. “Intensity, minimize the loss in possession and being able to stop their counterattacks, and we were unable to do so.”

Indeed, Barcelona failed to improve on any of those three aspects. It didn’t help that they went behind after only four minutes thanks to a penalty committed by Eric Garcia. But still, only down one and they looked bereft of ideas.