A few days ago on October 25, Barcelona suffered a rather surprising 1-0 defeat against Espanyol and the aftermath that rose with this result has seen Luis Enrique receiving heavy criticism mostly due to his selection decisions as none of Barcelona’s truly influential players were given playing time in this match and they ultimately succumbed to defeat.
When the match reached it’s end, Luis Enrique was questioned about his decision to drop his high profile and star players such as: Lionel Messi, Neymar and Luis Suarez.
The 46 year old Spanish manager defended his tactical decisions as he said:
“This is a world full of all types of criticism: constructive, destructive, pathetic. I have to think first about my team and we have a brutal schedule. With the games we have and the transatlantic journeys for many of the players, I do what I consider is best for the club.I accept the criticism, but I make the decisions I think are best for the team. You have to put yourself in my situation, although I accept that it could have annoyed some people.”
The Catalan Super Cup is not really one of the titles that Luis Enrique was focused on winning as the Spanish manager is mostly focusing on the Champions League and on the Spanish League. One of the other possible reasons of why Enrique opted to bench his key figures is to avoid seeing any of them picking up an injury in a match that just isn’t very important.
The last time that Barcelona won the Champions League was back on June 6 of 2015 when they overcame Juventus in the finals and Luis Enrique is hoping to add another European title to his and to Barcelona’s collection.
So far, things have been going superb for Barcelona in this season of the Champions League as they defeated Manchester City in their 1rst leg of the group stages with a scoreboard of 4-0 and they will be facing off in their 2nd leg on November 1rst.