Former Barcelona captain and Spain legend Carles Puyol visited training on Wednesday at the Ciutat Esportiva, perhaps in order to boost morale in a frustrated Blaugrana camp.
Xavi Hernandez has taken considerable stick of late for Barcelona’s poor performances, while also noting publicly that the media criticism of their performances was affecting the players. However Puyol visited training, which consisted of Pedri, Alejandro Balde, Marcos Alonso and a number of youth players.
Puyol told MD that he was entirely confident that Xavi would turn things around.
“It’s always good to meet friends. With Xavi we have experienced many things and I am very happy to be here. He looks good to me, I think he knows perfectly where he is, a club like Barca that is very demanding.”
“Now we are in a difficult moment but I am sure that he will manage it and will know how to transmit confidence to the players, who are the ones who have to pull through and turn the situation around.”
In terms of that criticism of the team, Puyol was clear that this was no surprise to anyone.
“We already know how it is at home, when you lose two games or there are two games in which you don’t play very well, there is a lot of criticism. There is maximum demand on the team and on Xavi. We have had difficult moments with injuries and that always makes it difficult for the team’s game but I have a lot of confidence, and ultimately, the evaluations must be made at the end of the season.”
As someone who spent 15 years of his career with Xavi, both at club and international level, Puyol should know better than anyone what he is capable of. Recently there has been some speculation that perhaps Xavi could do with a more natural leader in his backroom staff, and Culers may be wondering if Puyol wouldn’t do a good job of riling up a reaction from the Barcelona squad on a more permanent basis.
More must-reads: