Xavi in upbeat move despite Espanyol draw

Barcelona failed to win against Espanyol on Wednesday night for the first time since early December but Xavi denies that there is any concern and is confident there will be no drop in form.
Against Espanyol in the cup coach Pep Guardiola fielded a mainly second string team which included Pinto in goal and Caceres at centre-half. The real bad news on the night was the injury to Rafael Marquez which will rule him out for over a month.
Barca never looked like conceding a goal but neither created that many goal scoring chances, they will though be happy to go back to the Camp Nou next week and finish the contest off.
“We have a lot of reasons to be confident, the victories boost your morale and you go out onto the pitch expecting to win. We are ordered, disciplined and we play as a team, everything is going well so I have no reason to think that things will go down hill. Obviously the other teams will try to catch us but we are also thinking of increasing our lead.
Meanwhile rumours coming out of the Bernabeu that Real Madrid ex-president Florentino Perez is planning a raid on Barcelona for Lionel Messi a la Luis Figo in 2000 were laughed off by Xavi: “we are intelligent enough not to let the best player in the world leave us.”