Ernesto Valverde was at a loss to explain Barcelona’s shock defeat to Leganes on Wednesday as their unbeaten start to the season came to an abrupt end at Butarque.
It extended Barca’s mini-slump after they were held by Girona at the weekend at Camp Nou, which saw their four-game winning streak in the league come to an end.
“How do I explain it? This is football and these things can happen,” Valverde said in his post-game news conference. “Sometimes it’s difficult to explain what happens in a game.
“You have a game under control and then the opposition can do damage like [Leganes did] in one minute. Then they sat back and made it hard for us to create chances. There were a lot of bodies and it was tough.
“We had a double chance, but it wasn’t to be. We didn’t create the chances we would have liked. That’s five points dropped in three days and it’s difficult to explain.”
Valverde defended his decision to make changes, with both Jordi Alba and Luis Suarez left on the bench, replaced by Thomas Vermaelen and Munir El-Haddadi, respectively.
The Barca coach also said it was “opportunistic” to suggest the team’s lack of depth was to blame for their poor run of form given the season is still so young.
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