Barcelona manager Xavi has conceded that his side has lost the slim chance left to try and catch up to La Liga leaders Real Madrid after losing to Cadiz in a shocking defeat on Monday night.

Lucas Perez’s second-half goal was enough to ensure that Barcelona is winless in their last four outings with Cadiz.

Barcelona’s last win against Cadiz came in a 1-0 win in 2006, and Xavi has remained furious at passing up the chance to cut Real Madrid’s point gap.

“We are angry. We have lost a very good opportunity, a golden one, to differentiate ourselves from the Champions League teams, and we are practically saying goodbye to the league. I am angry. We have to play with more determination. We have to do more things. We have trained for this. I am the most responsible. We should have shown more enthusiasm”. Xavi said.

Real Madrid top La Liga with 75 points, fifteen more than Barcelona in second, although Barcelona has played one game less, and they are tied with Sevilla and Atletico Madrid in third and fourth, respectively.

Barcelona will play Real Sociedad on Thursday with the hope of breaking their two-game winless run.

Meanwhile, Mallorca helped their chances of survival with a 2-1 win over Alaves. After seeing their visitors having a fifth-minute goal ruled out by the VAR, Mallorca took the initiative with an 11-minute strike by Abdon Prats.

Vedat Muriqi then doubled the hosts’ advantage deep into first-half stoppage time. An own goal with 17 minutes left to play gave Alaves a lifeline, but they failed to take anything from the game and remained stuck at the root of the table, six points away from safety.

Elche had a smash and grab victory with a 1-0 win at Real Betis. Tete Morente scored the all-important goal with 8 minutes left on the clock.

Arnaut Danjuma was at the double as Villarreal got a 2-0 win over Valencia. The Dutch forward scored a tenth-minute penalty before adding a second goal seven minutes later.

Written by: Daniel Ademiju Idowu