Barcelona failed to capitalise on Real Madrid’s slip-up in the La Liga title race as they fell to a shock 1-0 defeat at the hands of UD Almeria on Sunday night.
Coming into the game with an opportunity to extend their lead at the top to ten points, the Blaugrana looked devoid of cutting edge, and intensity as El Bilal Toure’s first-half goal fired Almeria to an unexpected win.
And, according to SPORT, Barcelona manager Xavi Hernandez was extremely angry after his team’s loss to the relegation battlers and made sure to let his players know.
The 43-year-old tactician was unable to hide his disappointment after the game as he termed the performance on Sunday night as the Catalan giants’ ‘worst match of the season’.
Considering that Barcelona were coming into the game on the back of a defeat to Manchester United in the UEFA Europa League, Xavi sought a strong reaction from his troops.
However, what went down at the Power Horse Stadium was nothing like the response that the manager would have expected from his players after the midweek debacle in Europe.
Barça struggled to create meaningful opportunities against an Almeria side that looked solid and disciplined in their low block after taking the lead through Toure.
It is only natural for the manager to have been angry at how things went down in a game that they were expected to win fairly easily.
And Barcelona will need to step up and produce a strong reaction when they lock horns with arch-rivals Real Madrid later this week in the first leg of the Copa del Rey semi-finals at the Santiago Bernabeu.
