Spanish press: ‘Worrying, Koeman pays a high price for lost De...

Three points, that was the only good news about FC Barcelona on Wednesday evening. The team of Roanld Koeman played a bad game against Dinamo Kyiv, the Spanish media conclude. Frenkie de Jong was one of the dissonances.

Frenkie experiment failed ‘
Barça beat the battered Dinamo Kiev 2-1 by goals from Lionel Messi and Gerard Piqué. ‘Experiment with De Jong failed’, headlines Marca. The former Ajax player played in a ‘Koeman role’, as a stepping-in center-back. ‘Three points and little joy. Dinamo Kiev was exhausted by a corona outbreak, but Barça was unable to control the game. Only the efforts of Marc-André ter Stegen save Koeman, who looked for alternatives to the defense with De Jong in the center of the back and almost paid a high price. Koemans Barça is still under construction. ‘

The player report notes that Koeman made an unhappy impression during the match. “The image of him shaking his head on the couch was repeated over and over.” The performance of De Jong will not have satisfied the trainer either. ‘Koeman continues to look for solutions for De Jong. Experiment failed ‘, concludes Brand. And about Sergiño Dest: ‘He kept offering himself in the attack, but at Barça you also have to defend. Dest had it not easy and came too late to Dinamo’s goal. ‘

‘Terrible time Koeman’
“Barça created an infinite number of chances (seventeen goal attempts, ed.), But the lack of effectiveness turned out to be Barcelona’s big problem,” Mundo Deportivo analyzes. The eighth finals of the Champions League beckon after three wins in three games. A brilliant statistic, but it hides the suffering against Dinamo Kiev and the obvious lack of goals. ‘

Koeman had a terrible time on the couch. The television cameras followed him during the match and the images spoke volumes: he complained to his assistant Alfred Schreuder and made wild gestures. And that while Barça started so lively. It seemed to be a football party against the weakened Ukrainians, but the team stiffened and owed everything to Ter Stegen. ‘

MD finds it ‘worrying that no one took the lead’. It is a mental issue that Koeman will have to resolve. The team diluted in the second half. Of course, Barça has a lot of young players and so it is changeable. It alternates beautiful moments with bursts of tension. But there is still a lot of work to be done. Not just in the front. ‘

‘Frenkie not at ease, Dest alarming’
‘Barça plays with fire’, headlines AS. The Catalans are winning and consolidating first place in the Champions League group, but the reality is that it was below par. Barça played with fire and flirted with calamity in a match where the two keepers excelled. Ter Stegen performed wonders for Barça, but Ukrainian goalkeeper Ruslan Nescheret (18) should not be forgotten. He will never forget this evening. Had there been an audience at Camp Nou, the kid from Dinamo Kiev would have walked off the field with big applause. And the Barça players with disapproving murmurs. ‘

The newspaper based in Madrid saw De Jong ‘undeniably suffering’. It made it clear that De Jong does not feel comfortable as a central defender. Only in an emergency would Koeman put him in this position. It must be well thought out, not a whim, ‘said AS, who was also not impressed by Dest. “Started very dynamically and almost gave a great assist to Pedri, but his level started to drop alarmingly as the game went on.”

‘Surprising arrangement Koeman’
“The goals of Messi and Piqué plus the great performance of the returned Ter Stegen were most striking in a bad match against Barcelona,” said Diario SPORT, who then turned to the ‘masterful’ German goalkeeper. ‘How we missed you, Marc. But he’s not a superhero, although he sometimes tries to make us believe that. He cannot stop everything and had to capitulate at Tsygankov’s goal. ‘

Koeman surprised again with the line-up. The Dutch trainer opted for a very attacking starting eleven, with Frenkie de Jong as central defender and extra midfielder. Barça started strong, but fell back a long way. Koeman also failed to turn the script into a rather sleepy second half. ‘ De Jong gets a 5 from the Catalan daily newspaper. ‘Lost’, it sounds. “It can act as an emergency bandage, but it is clear that De Jong is not the solution.” Only Antoine Griezmann and Clément Lenglet also failed.