The Champions League elimination of Barcelona was deemed "a total failure
As Barcelona exited the Champions League at the group stage for the second consecutive season, the morning headlines in Spain were harsh: "Complete failure," "penance," and "night of fear
Barcelona's 3-0 home loss to Bayern Munich on Wednesday made them guaranteed that they would finish third and slide into the Europa League with one game remaining
The five-time Champions League champions were eager to downplay their intention to return to Europe's second-tier tournament, and manager Xavi and president Joan Laporta were no exception
Barcelona "don't deserve to be in the Champions League," said midfielder Pedri, 19, in a harsher tone
It's a failure for me, he continued
However, Laporta noted: "This is a new project
"We anticipated having ups and downs from the start
Barcelona's season in Europe has featured more ups than downs, as they have only collected four points from five Champions League games
They had a strong start to the season with a 5-1 victory against Viktoria Plzen of the Czech Republic, but they fell to Bayern Munich and Inter Milan before being held to a 3-3 draw at the Nou Camp by Inter.
After the Bayern loss, Xavi said, "This is our reality, and we need to confront it
"Perhaps we needed to take a pounding in order to mature
"It was too late; it was already over. The primary reason why
However, Laporta said: "This undertaking is new
"We anticipated having ups and downs from the start
It was too late to do anything; it was already over. We failed to be efficient up front in the previous games, which is the fundamental reason we found ourselves in this scenario
Barcelona invested about £200 million on new players before the 2022–23 season started, despite the team owing more than £1 billion in debt
La Liga financial requirements prevented them from originally registering a number of their new additions, but the club was able to raise money via a variety of "economic levers," including the sale of a portion of their future television rights and of their media production company Barca Studios