Hansi Flick suspected Barcelona player backed out of Inter semi-final without injury | OneFootball

Barcelona fell just short of their first Champions League final in a decade last season, with Inter equalising in stoppage time, and then grabbing the winner in extra time. Much of the debate after the game was about Hansi Flick’s decision to continue with such an offensive outlook, in spite of the scoreling being in Barcelona’s favour at that point.

However Flick was keen to change things, according to a fresh biography written by Sebastian Staszewski. Already the book has hit the headlines in Spain after it explained that Barcelona allegedly asked Robert Lewandowski to stop scoring goals in his debut season at the club. Now a second eyebrow-lifting anecdote has emerged.

Champions League semi-final anecdote

An anecdote from the book, as quoted by Sport, explains that with Barcelona trying to see out the final ten minutes of the match, Flick called on central defender Andreas Christensen, who said that he was not fit to play.

Image via Marca

“Flick’s assistant informed Christensen, who in turn told him that… His back was hurting. Flick wasn’t convinced the Dane was actually injured, but he didn’t have time to dwell on it, as Inter were giving their all in the fight and every second counted. Only Flick kept his cool. Knowing his team would be bombarded with crosses, he decided to bring on the 187-centimeter-tall Andreas Christensen, but he couldn’t.”

As it transpired, Lewandowski seemed equally weak physically, as he attempted to come back from a hamstring strain suffered weeks earlier, and neither his aerial prowess nor his offensive talent could see Barcelona through.

Christensen’s injury narrative

The Danish defender played seven minutes in the first leg of the semi-final in Barcelona, and then completed the full 90 minutes against Real Valladolid three days before the return in Milan. Following the game in Italy, Christensen played 33 minutes against Real Madrid in the Champions League.

The 29-year-old has suffered significant injury issues though, and it is completely feasible that back pain kept him out of one game, and then receded again several days later. Recently Christensen reacted angrily to the narrative that he was injury prone though, and this will not help his chances of shaking that narrative.