FC Barcelona Vs. Espanyol: Xavi First Victory, Depay Scores, Nico Injured in Catalan Derby Battle!

The Barca Breakdown discuss Xavi's first game as victors of the Catalan Derby. While we believed the Xavi may deploy a 4-2-3-1 due to a lack of attackers, to our surprise, Xavi deployed a 4-3-3. In place of the injured attackers (Dembele, Fati, Brathwaite), Xavi placed Gavi on the Left wing and Barca B youngster Ilias with Depay in the middle. The first half had many flashes of promising play from Busquets and Frenkie De Jong moving the ball forward and players creating some shots on goal. We criticized the fact that players are taking low percentage shots from outside the box. Luckily, in the second half, Depay was awarded a penalty and subsequently scored it to take Barca to a 1-0 lead. As the second half progressed, players seemed to struggle to prevent the Espanyol attackers from creating threatening opportunities. Two of which were headers that were just outside the post. Overall, Xavi deployed Barca youngsters in a promising fashion, with some improvements. The team still needs to clean up their defense coming into the Champions League game against Benfica. Lastly, we emphasize the need to give Xavi time to lead our team and the players to adjust under the difficult situation (including the injured players previously mentioned and Pedri/Nico). Please like, comment and subscribe to our channel! Twitter: https://twitter.com/BarcaBreakdown​​​​​ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/barcabreakdown Listen to our podcast on Spotify or Apple/Itunes Podcast. Please support the Barca Breakdown and subscribe to our channel and like our videos. Please let us know in the comments what type of content you want to see more of!