Barcelona manager Xavi has revealed that his team still needs to recover from the 2-1 defeat to Real Madrid in the El Clasico last weekend despite not having to play any fixture from then until Saturday when they traveled to the Basque country.

Ronald Araujo was the hero of the night, but his goal, which was eventually the winner, didn’t come until the stoppage time of the game, and Xavi used the opportunity to address the talk about the El Clasico again, saying the team gave enough and deserved to win that game.

“Last week, we deserved to win, and we lost, and today, when we didn’t deserve to win, we won. I’m very happy because the Clásico affected us more than I thought. The first 25 minutes of today are unacceptable… But this is football, and it’s a golden victory.” Xavi said.

Barcelona took the lead last weekend as early as the sixth minute of the game through Ilkay Gundogan, but an unexpected second-half turnaround saw Real Madrid and Jude Bellingham crawl back to win the game.

However, unlike the week when Barcelona was free and had no midweek game to prosecute, the Blaugrana will be on the road in the UEFA Champions League on Tuesday against Ukrainian side Shakhtar Donetsk.

The game is the reversal of the first leg a fortnight ago, where Barcelona defeated the Europeans 2-1. Barcelona remains unbeaten in their UEFA Champions League group after winning all three group-stage games so far.

After Tuesday’s fourth UEFA Champions League game, Barcelona will be at home to Alaves and travel to Rayo Vallecano in their next two La Liga games.

After the weekend’s results from La Liga, Barcelona remained third with 27 points, while Real Madrid are in second with 29 points after a goalless draw against Rayo. Girona was able to create a two-point lead at the summit.

Daniel Ademiju Idowu