Thrashed by Madrid, trailing in LaLiga title race... Is Xavi's time up at Barca?

Xavi's current plight at Barcelona ticks all the boxes for a coach walking towards the sack.

'I think we are a lot closer to success than to failure,' he said in his media conference on Wednesday, adding: 'We succeeded last season and the one before'.

That was a reference to how he had been brought in mid-campaign two seasons ago to ensure that the team finished in the top four and met that target; and that last season the target was to win the league and he achieved that.

It was an upbeat display ahead of Thursday's game and he set the target this season as 'winning a trophy', naming the cup along with the Champions League and league as the three options.

Asked about the disillusion among supporters he said that the fans he had encountered had been overwhelmingly positive towards him.

But regular crowds of around 35,000 in the 49,000 capacity Olympic Stadium tell a different story.

Last season Barcelona won the league with 10 1-0 victories. This season the football had to get better and it hasn't. Worse still, players have gone backwards.

Alejandro Balde, Ronald Araujo, Jules Kounde, Frenkie de Jong and Robert Lewandowski have all been worse than last season and many see the coach as being to blame for that.

Summer signings Ilkay Gundogan and Oriol Romeu have also been a shadow of the players they were at Manchester City and Girona.

On Wednesday, in reference to Gavi's season-long injury, Xavi called him the 'soul of the team' and said missing him for so long was a 'stake through the heart'.

He also lamented the loss of injured keeper and captain Marc-Andre ter Stegen.

And it's also true that he wanted the club to keep Ousmane Dembele and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and the former is now the top assist provider in Ligue 1 and the