Midfielder admits the team needs to improve in “a little bit of everything”
Barcelona midfielder Frenkie de Jong has urged his teammates to dismiss any comparisons to last season and focus on improving now.
Hansi Flick’s side are five points behind rivals Real Madrid in La Liga and stumbled to a 3-3 draw against Club Brugge in the Champions League on Wednesday night.
The club won a domestic treble last season but were defeated by Inter Milan in the Champions League semi-finals. Fans and pundits have pointed out a drop-off form performances last term to performances now, with Barcelona far more open at the back.
But De Jong, who captained the side in Bruges, urged the team to stop dwelling on last season’s performances.
“We have to leave last year in the past,” said De Jong. “Last year, we weren’t the best team in Europe, so we don’t need to keep comparing ourselves to then.
“We did not win the Champions League and we also conceded a lot of goals, so we have to improve.”
Flick said in his post-match reaction that Barcelona were not going to abandon their attacking approach, calling it the club’s DNA. Instead, the German pointed out that there were little improvements needed all over the pitch in order to make it more difficult to beat their high line.
De Jong echoed his manager: “There are things we have to adjust, we know that. We’re working hard, but we can’t express it on the pitch at the moment.
“We are weak on the counter right now, whether that’s to do with tracking runners or positioning at the back, it’s probably a little bit of everything.”
