Barca defender Eric Garcia: Almeria defeat is a blow

Eric Garcia was very disappointed with Barca's 1-0 defeat at Almeria, which prevented the team going 10 points clear at the top of La Liga. Xavi's side had the chance to move well clear of Real Madrid after their draw in the Madrid derby against Atletico, but the round ended with Los Blancos one point closer to the Blaugrana.

The centre-back was very blunt about the shortcomings that led Barça to lose without scoring a goal against the second-highest conceding team in La Liga: "In the first half we had neither rhythm nor intensity. In the second half we looked for a goal, but they accumulated a lot of players in their area and it was impossible."

The home-grown player regretted not having taken advantage of the opportunity that Real Madrid had handed them with their defeat the day before: "They were very tight in the middle. They let us cross, but they had a lot of people and it was difficult to get anything out. It's a blow, because Madrid had a slip-up and we had the chance to extend our lead. We've had two very tough defeats, but we have to keep going because we have a very important game on Thursday."

And he reiterated that the problem was a lack of intensity: "The Clasico didn't affect us. It's just that we didn't come out with the necessary intensity. That's all there was to it. We knew they were going to close down at the back and that they have very quick players on the counter-attack, but the problem was more our problem."