It must be infuriating for a manager to come up with a plan to cope with an injury crisis, especially when all of your first team options in a certain position pick up injuries close to a crucial game.
Barca were already short at left back going into their Champions League clash with Inter Milan, Junior Firpo was the last remaining senior option who was used to playing in that position.
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Unfortunately he picked up an injury late this afternoon which leaves Ernesto Valverde with an injury crisis to contend with:
[BREAKING NEWS]
@JuniorFirpo03 ruled out of #BarçaInter through injury
More info ? https://t.co/vbU5eUGhVV ? pic.twitter.com/EWT0hHss7A
— FC Barcelona (@FCBarcelona) October 2, 2019
A report from AS stated that Jordi Alba and Samuel Umtiti were already missing through injury before Firpo picked up his.
The full backs are integral with Barca’s system, especially in an attacking sense as they need to supply width to create space for the wider forwards to operate.
Their potential options now would be Clement Lenglet who is left-footed but is really a centre back. He might be able to offer some balance in terms of his footed-ness, but you wouldn’t imagine he would cause a lot of damage going forward.
The report goes on to suggest that Sergi Roberto or Nelson Semedo will probably have to move to cover the left hand side. It would give Inter an obvious part of the pitch to try and exploit and could cause any attacks down that flank to become too narrow.
You still expect them to win this one, but this will certainly make things harder.