Barcelona’s loss in their last La Liga match against Valencia has pushed them back in the title race, but, one of their senior players Javier Mascherano is still very confident and he reckons that the title has not gone out of his team’s hands.

If technically seen, the Argentinean defender is not wrong as there are still more than 15 games to go in the league. So, there is enough time left for things to turn around. But, the kind of form the other title contenders are in at the moment, this defeat might prove to be very costly for Barcelona.

Barcelona went into the game against Valencia with all cylinders firing. They took the lead in the 7th minute courtesy Alex Sanchez. They managed to keep up that lead throughout the first half and it seemed as if it would be another easy win for the defending champions, but, the second half started in a dramatic fashion. The visitors found the net twice within 3 minutes and got ahead by 2-1 to silence the huge number of home fans who had gathered there.

However, it didn’t take Barcelona too much time to level up as Lionel Messi converted a penalty successfully in the 54th minute, but, just 5 minutes later, the hosts were trailed again and the man who had done the damage for them this time around was Paco Alcacer. The 20 years old forward placed his sweep shot to perfection and stunned everybody.

Barcelona couldn’t equalize thereafter and ended up suffering their second defeat in the tournament.

Talking to the reporters after the match, Mascherano said, “It’s not ideal to get beaten in home games. We need to make sure that such thing doesn’t happen again in the rest of the season.”
“It’s very much possible for us to bounce back as there is no lack of time, but, we can’t afford any more mistakes.”