LUIS ENRIQUE has declared himself a fan of Brendan Rodgers as he warmly welcomed Celtic's return to the Champions League.
With the class you would expect from Barcelona's erudite head coach, he spoke well and highly of the club his team will face in the Nou Camp on the opening night of the group stage matches. You got the impression he was not saying this just to be polite.
Enrique was not so happy to talk about a slagging match which has taken place between Cristiano Ronaldo and Xavi, and he was asked time and again about his side losing at the weekend, a topic he grew tired of, but when the subject of Celtic came up he was happy to hand out praise.
"I like Brendan as a coach," admitted Enrique. "I knew him from before when I met him at the Mini Estadi watching Barca B. He's a lover of good football, he plays an attractive style and I like coaches who attack.
"I also like coaches who let players have the burden and take the initiative, like Celtic do. We have watched them and they have players who can cause us problems in attack. Brendan is a good coach and I like his ideas on football."
And on Celtic, the Barcelona coach was equally gushing about their place in European football. The sad thing for Rodgers is that Enrique and his players will not be so generous come the actual game itself.
"Celtic is a historic club," he said. "They are back in the Champions League and have achieved the right results with the right club. There were other teams in pot four who it would have been less complicated to draw.
"But we are happy to play Celtic and we will go to one of the best stadiums in Europe, in terms of atmosphere.
"Celtic have talented players. Moussa Dembele scored his hat-trick against Rangers and in Scott Sinclair and Patrick Roberts, they have some high-quality players who can cause us problems."
You could easily be fooled into believing Barcelona are in the middle of a full blown crisis.
They did after all lose a match, at the Nou Camp no less, to a club such as Alaves who returned to La Liga after a ten year absence. The newspapers in Spain have dissected and discussed the result to death and they believe a solution is at hand.
And that is to start Lionel Messi, Neymar and Luis Suarez at the same time for the first match this season. Simple, really.
The press conference at Barcelona’s training ground on Monday afternoon was packed and the local journalists seemed far more interested in the Alaves match then the thoughts of Enrique about Celtic. Indeed, the press pack seemed still shocked to their core that their team, and there is no pretence of neutrality, didn’t win.
Many of Barcelona’s players were left out of the weekend. They will return on Tuesday night. Barcelona, you see, don’t lose two games in a row.
“I hope the Alaves result has no impact on the squad," said Enrique. "We analyse the games afterwards. That is normal.
“We have things to improve and work on. That’s what happens after every defeat. The objective is to win the next game. That’s all we can think about right now.
“If we can qualify and win the group, then great. But the key thing is to beat Celtic. We will move the ball and try to overcome the high pressure and we need to be stronger in defence.
“I was clear after the Alaves game. I explained what I thought had happened and I have assessed it since. We know what we have to work on to try and achieve a good result.
“Football is not an exact science. You can’t win every game but we will look to improve. We will identify problems and try to find a solution. But what we have achieved speaks for itself.
"The team deserves to have the confidence of the fans after the achievements of the last few years."
Jordi Alba, one of those big names rested at the weekend, will return at left-back and believed this Celtic side are a big improvement on the one which let in six goals on their last visit to this part of the world.
“We are excited about the Champions League getting underway," said Alba. "In Celtic, we face an opponent who have improved a lot since we last met them three years ago. You can see that. We have watched them a lot.
“Celtic are very good on the ball. We are going to have to play well because we want to start this competition with three points. Like every year we will try to do well in the competition, to win the three titles we aspire to win.
"We will try to compete and see what we can do. We’re excited for the return of the Champions League and we'll see at the end of the season if we are able to win it."
Barcelona (probable): Cillessen: Sergi Roberto, Pique, Umtiti, Alba; Busquets, Rakitic, Iniesta; Messi, Suarez, Neymar
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