Rotations which leave Barca with bittersweet flavour

Xavi made up to five changes to the eleven that he presented last Saturday at the Olímpic Lluís Companys stadium against Celta. He made it clear before the game: he wanted to make rotations, to spread the exertion and to allow all the players to participate in the team's good moment. However, as the coach himself confessed after the match against Mallorca (2-2), due to "careless mistakes, we left without the victory".

The players who were rested were Koundé, Christensen, Marcos Alonso and Lewandowski, as well as Frenkie de Jong, who was injured. They were replaced by Araujo, Iñigo Martínez, Balde, Raphinha and Gavi. In other words, there were three changes at the back, one in the engine room and one in attack.

They were not long in coming. After eight minutes, Mallorca took the lead after an unfortunate mistake by Ter Stegen, who did not combine well with Romeu. And despite Raphinha levelling the contest, another defensive error by the Catalan team - Ter Stegen and Araujo did not understand each other when it came to closing down - and Abdón took advantage of the indecision to give the Balearic team the lead again. Finally, an action by Fermín saved a point.