Valverde on Real Madrid’s ‘crisis’

Barcelona head coach Ernesto Valverde has refused to buy into talk of a crisis at Real Madrid after the the Estadio Santiago Bernabeu outfit found themselves seven points behind the Catalans going into the sixth round of La Liga action after slumping at home to Betis in midweek.

A first-of-its-kind La Liga derby comes up on Saturday when leaders Barca visit their newly promoted compatriots in a long-overdue matchup that Catalonia has been yearning for for generations.

Pointing to the bad press Barcelona received at the end of the transfer window and following the Supercopa loss, Valverde warned that perspectives can change quickly.

“One month ago it was us who were supposedly a disaster. Everything changes from week to week here.

“According to the results, some teams are on the up and some are declining.” said the Barca boss as quoted in MARCA

With Barça set to play its fifth match in a 15-day span, and with another midweek tilt set for next week in the Champions League, there was plenty of speculation about who would crack the squad for the trip to Girona.

Not available will be the 20-year-old French striker, Ousmane Dembélé, who had successful surgery earlier in the week and will be out for around three and a half months. Likely to return to the starting XI, however, is Luis Suárez, who rested during Barça’s 6–1 win over Eibar on Tuesday night at Camp Nou.