The legendary former midfielder has been linked with replacing Ernesto Valverde in the Camp Nou hot seat after the club's disastrous form in La Liga.
Barcelona legend Xavi says he would be up to the challenge of managing former team-mates like Lionel Messi, Luis Suarez and Sergio Busquets at the club.
The 39-year-old former midfielder is currently manager of Al-Sadd in Qatar. His side have won all three of their league fixtures this season, scoring 13 goals in the process, and are in the semi-finals of the Asian Champions League.
But Xavi is not thinking of the role as an audition for the Barca job, though the Camp Nou hotseat is one he would seemingly like to fill.
“I don’t know if it will be a bridge to Barca,” he told Catalan newspaper Ara. “The only thing that worries me now is doing well here, winning titles and making mistakes in some aspects to learn for the future.
“It wouldn’t be a problem [to manage former team-mates]. I know what Leo is like, and Luis [Suarez], Busquets, Jordi [Alba], [Gerard] Pique or Sergi [Roberto].
“I know how they train, their capacity for leadership, I can tell if they are sad or angry. I hope as a coach I could have three, five, eight or 10 players that I already knew and that I already had a good relationship with.
“[Messi] is a player who, if you convince him, he can even be a brilliant defender. He has physical and mental speed. He has everything. If you convince him to run, what will the others do? They will run twice as much.”
Saturday’s defeat to Granada came after Barca were lucky to escape with a draw at Borussia Dortmund, in the first game of their Champions League campaign.
The harrowing European defeats to Liverpool and Roma in the past two seasons weigh heavily over the club and Valverde, but with bad form now spilling over into domestic matters, many fans are losing patience.
Some have pointed to the underwhelming performances of new signing Frenkie de Jong, who has generally been played in a more advanced role than for the Netherlands and previous club Ajax.
“The problem in the midfield is that nobody is doing any defensive work, so they suffer when they have to retreat,” Xavi said.
“The coach is very important, but without the players there is nothing to do.”
royal12
200
Come save Barcelona before they go to Europa[Crylaugh][Crylaugh]
ViscaCatalonya
91
This will be a dream come through, but some said Valverde keeps board’s nude pics so I guess this won’t happen till 2021, yes? 😨😨
cosackntz
73
From his very first season, I have been saying he isn't a coach for Barcelona but people kept calling me names. His tactics are weak, we narrowly win of which most of the wins came as a result of individual performances/brilliance, he's too defense minded forgetting that the best form of defense is attack, he isn't bold nor have strong mentality, he's always trying to play safe and finally, I kept saying he was eroding our philosophy even when we had an unbeaten run in his first season because our matches were boring to watch. I don't blame this negative Mr Bean of a coach alone, he wasn't suppose to return to the club after Roma disaster yet he did, the same disaster came last season with Liverpool yet he was retained and to crown it all, he lost our birth right (Copa De Rey) by losing the final to Valencia that Arsenal flogged home and away in Europa and yet the board still didn't sack him. Let's motivate all the Camp Nou fans who will be watching our matches live at the stadium starting from midweek to raise banners with Bartomeu Out, Valverde Out massively, maybe we might still be able to redeem this season but we obviously don't need Mourinho, he doesn't play Barca pattern of football nor possess our DNA. It will just amount to panic signing just like what Man U did and we all know the result. Mourinho doesn't fit into our long term goal, Barcelona is known for having a long term project where young talents are being groomed to become superstars, let's get Ajax coach cos I know we can't get Guardiola back for now.