We didn't create chances only by crossing the ball, this is simply false.
Raphinha miss in the first half which he should have scored tbh, and the Lewandowski miss at the end were both created with through balls. The team created plenty of chances vs an Espanyol who parked the bus the whole game almost.
Criticizing the manager is fair game, but not after this game. After games like Celta home, Mallorca, sure, but vs Espanyol the shitstorm after the game is mostly moaning around for no reason, but the usual forum hate. We dominated the game, the rival barely had any chances, and should have won by 2-3 goals difference.
What will happen in the future we shall see.
You misunderstood me. I am not criticizing him for Espanyol game alone. This entire season I can't see any signs of improvement. We have spent a lot of money and we are definitely under-performing in big games. In CL we under-performed heavily. We were great in that first game against Bayern but we were underwhelming in both games against Inter and especially against Bayern at home. I will be the first one to admit that he lacked entire defense during that time but against an average Inter we simply needed to show much more. IMHO we were playing much better football from the moment he took over and until that away game against Real. After that 4-0 win we basically stopped improving.
Another problem for me are our signings and potential signings during his time here.
Lewa - too old and too expensive player with too long contract. He is under-performing in big games and I suppose he was brought in for those big games.
Auba - probably the best signing in the last couple of years.
Raphinha - he definitely needs to show more and was way too expensive
Torres - same as Raphinha
Kessie - he was free but IMHO he doesn't suit our way of playing and should be sold ASAP
Christensen - OK signing so far
Kounde - IMHO he is a great signing but can not be used as a RB anymore
Alonso - a player who can only be a good LB backup for Barca but ended up playing as a CB
Xavi also wanted to sign
Azpiliqueta - a 33y old finished player. He also wanted to send
Balde on a loan and it turned out he is now our best LB in the squad.
In addition to that we are now chasing finished players like Kante or Jorghinho and tying to persuade Busquets to renew for another season. Furthermore, I am 99% certain that we would splash additional 60 mil on Zubimendi right now if we could. That's just a bad planing and horrible decision making. Try to acknowledge that we have paid around 115 mil for Raphinha and Torres while in the same time Benfica signed Enzo Fernandez for 14 mil and City signed Julian Alvarez for 21 mil! That's just mental.
Barca is broke so we need to spend wisely. However, we have spent a huge amount of money on old or average players that don't suit our style of play. All of that was done with Xavi's blessing so that also has to be taken into a consideration when we evaluate his work here.
