Barcelona, After being knocked out of the Europa League by Manchester United last Thursday, things have gone from bad to worse for Xavi’s Barcelona as they suffered a shock 1-0 loss to Almeria in the Spanish LaLiga Santander.
The LaLiga Santander leaders fell to only their second league defeat of the season at the Power Horse Stadium, having last been beaten by Real Madrid at the Estadio Santiago Bernabeu in October 2022, the Spanish MARCA newspaper reported.
The 1-0 defeat means that Barcelona’s lead at the top of the table has been cut to seven points, benefitting from Real Madrid also dropping points against Atletico Madrid.
Xavi made several changes to his team across the field, with Eric Garcia making a rare start while Ferran Torres and Gavi both came into the attack.
However, there was no sign of any fresh legs and Almeria started the tie with great intensity to make Barcelona nervous from the off.
The first real chance for either side came as El Bilal Toure rocketed the ball beyond Marc Andre ter Stegen into the back of the net on 24 minutes.
Almeria counter-attacked rapidly and Toure held the ball up well to knock it back to Luis Suarez, who fed an assist over Andreas Christensen for Toure to add the finishing touch.
The stadium erupted as the goal was enough to mean that Almeria would step out of the relegation zone.
Barcelona tried to fight back but failed to do so, recording just one shot on target throughout the 90 minutes.
Xavi made changes with Raphinha coming off the bench at half time, later throwing in youngsters Pablo Torre and Angel Alarcon, but it was to no avail.
The result means that Barcelona have now suffered two consecutive defeats before they head to the Estadio Santiago Bernabeu on Thursday, 2 March 2023 to play Real Madrid in the Copa del Rey semi-final first leg.
Source: Oman News Agency