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Alves not bothered by Barca’s table descent

Comment: 0 October 25th, 2011 by: admin

Daniel Alves recently commented that he was unconcerned with Barcelona’s crashing from the first place to third in the Primera Liga as they will eventually regain the prime table spot.

The La Liga leaderboard currently show the top position occupied by Levante; in second place are Real Madrid, who formerly trailed Barcelona and consistently stayed one step behind them.

Now, however, Barca are found trailing Real Madrid by one point, and one place in the table.

Barca manager Pep Guardiola’s men fell to third after failing to claim a victory against Sevilla last week.  The match, which ended with a scoreless draw, cost the Catalans 2 more points which would have kept them at first place, leading Levante on goal difference.

Real Madrid would have been on third place.

‘That’s just a sideshow at this point,’ said Alves, speaking of rivals Real Madrid’s current lead.  ‘They are ahead of us, and of course they will be happy about that.’

The 28-year old right back continued, saying that there are many more chances to be expected in the future.

‘We are behind them now, but there is a long way to go yet,’ he said, ‘and I’m sure that many things will happen.’

The scoreless draw between Barca and Sevilla included a failed goal opportunity after star player Lionel Messi missed a penalty shot against defender Javi Varas.  The game happened on the same day that Real Madrid gave hosts Malaga a 4-0 thrashing that earned them 3 points.

Alves insisted that Barca will continue to perform as one of the top teams in the league, unperturbed by landing in third place.

‘Everything is hard and complicated, but there is no way that this will make us doubt ourselves,’ he said.  ‘We are a great team – win, lose or draw.

‘We have shown that over the years and one result won’t change that.’

The situation was taken graciously by Guardiola, who after the match readily congratulated Sevilla on their victory.

‘We must congratulate the Sevilla defence as tonight’s big-game player Javi Varas,’ he said.  ‘However, I think we played well, but we must congratulate the performance of Sevilla, and get back up and kick back on Tuesday.’

Recalling the match, the coach identified Sevilla’s defence as the determining factor, never collapsing despite Barca’s pressure.

‘It’s never easy to play against a team that plays too defensively, with nine players at the back, as there is no room,’ said Guardiola.  ‘Sevilla had only one attack at our goal, but we also saw that we could score a goal on the counter.’

The coach added that they were unable to convert despite having majority of the possession throughout the game.

‘We had 77% possession but we failed to find that first goal, even if we did have many occasions to attack their defence,’ he recalled.

Guardiola’s men are set to next face Granada in a La Liga match Tuesday night at the Estadio Nuevo los Carmenes.

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