Xavi has revealed that Barcelona are ‘dreaming big’ and hope to win this season’s Champions League.
The Catalan giants have been handed an immensely difficult group, being drawn alongside Bayern Munich and Inter.
Given that and the fact that they’re still in the early stages of their rebuild under Xavi, Barca don’t head into the competition as one of the favourites as they have so many times before.
And while Xavi has acknowledged it will be difficult though, he has said that Barcelona are aiming for nothing less than Champions League glory.
“We will compete and dream big. Otherwise, I would have stayed at home,” he said ahead of their opening match against Viktoria Plzen. “Why can’t we win this competition? Barca is about winning. I like to win, I can’t conceive competing without winning.
“Being favourites is something else. You have to be humble. Every match is going to be a war. We haven’t won a Champions League title here since 2015.”
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He also isn’t afraid of putting any added pressure on himself or his players by setting such goals, and added the everybody at the club thrives under it.
“We welcome the pressure here, there is pressure every day when you are at Barcelona,” he added.
“We have won five Champions League titles under pressure. Dreaming about winning again is not adding pressure.”
For now though, he has called for his team to focus on getting out of the Group of Death.
“For now we need to be focused on our goal which is advancing to the knockout stage,” Xavi continued. “We have to reach at least the last 16 in such a difficult competition and a very complicated group.
“The objectives, however, are winning titles, but for tomorrow we have to win in our debut.”