1st half
In the very first minutes of the game, Barca players were desperately looking for a goal and almost didn't let Valencia touch the ball. Alfred Schreuder's 3-1-4-2 formation with two ball-playing defenders (Araujo and Lenglet) was working quite well as we kept on creating chances.
The only thing we lacked in the first 45 minutes was a good final touch.
The Bats, in turn, had a few promising counterattacks but just one of them turned into a quality scoring chance.
1st-half rating: 9/10
2nd half
Valencia were much braver after the break. Following Goncalo Guedes' dangerous try, they took advantage of Clement Lenglet's mistake and scored from a corner kick.
Luckily, Barca didn't plan to give up. They started to play fast-paced football and turned things around in a couple of minutes. It's worth a mention that Barca looked much better on the left side despite Jordi Alba's unimpressive first half, though the team exploited the central area more often.
Valencia scored a lucky goal from outside the area but Leo Messi's individual brilliance won us the three points.
2nd-half rating: 7/10
Full-time rating: 8/10
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Good starting XI, not enough subs: Rating Schreuder's decisions from 1-10 in Valencia win
In Ronald Koeman's absence, assistant coach Alfred Schreuder took charge of the team in the away clash against Valencia. Although Barcelona got the three points at a tough venue, the performance was far from perfect. Here's how Tribuna.com rate the Dutch tactician's decisions in the 3-2 win against Valencia.
Good starting XI
There were four changes made to the line-up, in comparison to the previous match. With Oscar Mingueza committing a goal-leading mistake in the previous match, it was only normal that Ronald Araujo got his chance. The Uruguayan had a few mistakes against Valencia but was decent overall.
Clement Lenglet replacing Samuel Umtiti was another no-brainer from Schreuder. Umtiti no longer seems like a viable candidate to be a regular starter at Barca and Lenglet, with all his faults, is definitely the better option.
Sergino Dest replaced Sergi Roberto who did next to nothing against Granada, and Pedri, having got his rest, appeared from the start once again. However, the 18-year-old didn't look entirely fresh, so maybe it was the time to give a chance to either Miralem Pjanic or Riqui Puig.
Not enough subs
It was a good sign that Barca didn't panic after the conceded goal and continued playing their football. After creating several chances in the first half, they were sure to get more opportunities in the second, and they did. However, Schreuder should've perhaps twisted the line-up during the game a little more.
Roberto and Ilaix Moriba coming on in the 75th minute were the only changes the Dutchman made. However, with Valencia pushing higher as they were looking for the equaliser, it would've made a lot of sense to replace Antoine Griezmann with Ousmane Dembele. Dembouz is a pacy player that could've taken advantage of the free spaces Los Che were leaving behind in the last 20 minutes.
Besides, subbing in Puig could've been a good idea, as the 21-year-old is a press-resistant player that flourishes when the opposition is playing with a high backline. Had the additional two subs happened, Blaugrana might've scored the fourth goal to kill the game entirely, but it wasn't the case. And finally, Pjanic for Sergio Busquets also seems like a good option as the latter was looking tired towards the end of the game.
All that being said, we have to cut Schreuder some slack as it was his first game in charge at the club and it happened to be at a stadium that Barca hadn't won at since 2016.
Manager's rating: 6.5/10
Lenglet: 'Every shot against us is a goal. We have to do something about that'
"In the last games, every time we conceded a chance it was a goal against us, so we have to do something. Although the second goal today was a bit of bad luck because it was unstoppable," Clement Lenglet said after the Valencia win.
"We have done what we had to do, which is winning, although it was a strange match," the centre-back concluded.
The two goals Barcelona conceded against Valencia were results of mistakes. First, Marc-Andre ter Stegen didn't check his surroundings when leaving the goal line and Lenglet lost the player he was supposed to mark. In the second, the Catalans lost the ball in their own half and no defender closed in on Carlos Soler as he was preparing to take the shot.
