Barcelona kick off Champions League against Royal Antwerp

The Champions League has not been a tournament where Barcelona has found much success the last couple of seasons.

The Catalan side has been eliminated from the group stage and ‘relegated’ to the Europa League in each of the last two editions.

Despite coming off their best performance of the season against Real Betis, Xavi Hernandez isn’t taking anything for granted on the eve of their Champions League opener against Belgian side Royal Antwerp.

“It’s time to step up in the Champions League,” Xavi said in his pre-match press conference. “We are starting at home, in front of our fans, and we are in great form.

“The goal is to finish top of our group and be seeded in the draw for the knockout stage. But this is about deeds not words. Last season the team got the  playing side of things right but not the results. This year we need to play well and get results.”

Drawn against the likes of Bayern Munich and Inter Milan last season, Barcelona only picked up one point out of a possible 12.

Given the investments Barcelona made with the arrivals of Oriol Romeu, Ilkay Gundogan, Joao Felix and Joao Cancelo, the pressure is there once again to reach the knockout phase.

“There is a positive mood in the camp, we’re optimistic,” Romeu said. “The team is getting better with every game and the idea is to keep that going. Europe is a big challenge and we’ll be playing against some very strong teams. That’s why we need to be at our best and get off to a good start.

“We need to play good football and show what we are capable of doing. This squad can go very far and we are here to have a great year in Europe.”

On paper, Royal Antwerp is ‘the weakest’ team in the group. Playing at home, Barcelona will be the team on the front foot.

It will be interesting to see what system Xavi uses.

In the 5-0 win over Real Betis, he went with the traditional 4-3-3, playing Joao Felix and Ferran Torres on the wing. It’s the best they’ve looked this season and the scoreline reflected that. Xavi could revert back to four midfielders with Gundogan coming back in the side and Gavi on the left of the front three.

Barcelona haven’t looked their best with the 4-4-2 formation and it seems to have a negative effect on Robert Lewandowski. It also puts a lot more pressure on the wide forward to do all the work. That’s another issue for Xavi to solve in terms of whether he picks Raphinha or the youngster Lamine Yamal.

What is different this time around compared to last season is Barcelona will mostly have their entire defensive  backline. Ronald Araújo won’t be available but Jules Koundé and Andreas Christensen should be good to go. Playing in his natural position, Koundé has looked solid. Signing Cancelo has meant an upgrade for the entire defense, not just at right-back.

Xavi has proven he can do it in the league as they won the title last season. Now he needs to prove he can do it in the Champions League as well. As a matter of fact, the club needs to prove it, too.