Barcelona's problem this season is not only about the goal productivity of their strikers, but Barcelona is also disturbed in defense. Barcelona only conceded 20 goals in 38 matches last season, but this season they have conceded 19 goals in 17 matches. Barcelona's goals per game ratio is relatively low compared to Bilbao, Atletico Madrid, Girona and also Real Madrid. These are several problems that Xavi must immediately resolve, otherwise Barcelona will not be able to compete until the end of the season to defend its title.
Until week 17, Real Madrid was the strongest team in defense with only conceding 11 goals. Their goal productivity is also very impressive, but unfortunately Girona, who is in good form, has managed to lead the standings at the moment. I know Real Madrid can easily throw Girona into second place, that's because the gap between the two points is only 2 points.
For defense problems, it seems that Xavi is giving too many experiments that make this not very good for them, such as when sometimes putting Kounde or even Cancelo in different positions which makes their performance not 100 percent maximum because they have to adapt to a new position besides that, this is like what @red4slash said indirectly Barcelona's performance and the attack patterns they make are what makes the defense disturbed. Until week 17, Real Madrid was the strongest team in defense with only conceding 11 goals. Their goal productivity is also very impressive, but unfortunately Girona, who is in good form, has managed to lead the standings at the moment. I know Real Madrid can easily throw Girona into second place, that's because the gap between the two points is only 2 points.
We know that with the tiki taka that occurs, the quality of Barcelona's attacks, especially when especially when trying to control the rhythm, there will definitely be a lot of players who must be ready in attack, making some of their defenders inevitably have to help attack which makes their defense a lot of gaps that can be exploited.
This is what happens when their attacking patterns are read and indeed conceding 19 goals at the moment is a problem especially when compared to before where they were so strong that they even conceded only 20 goals in 38 games played last season.
Actually if I look at the current composition of the players, i prefer to enter Kounde as a right fullback and restore Cancelo's position at left fullback to replace Balde.
Balde is a pretty good player but he is a slow player so this could be a problem when the fullback is too far in the opposition defence he won't be able to get back to his position properly when the counter attack is launched.
At the moment the first half between Barcelona and Almeria is over and the score at the end of the first half is 1-1. Of course this must be a concern because if in this match Barcelona still fail to win full points then their position in terms of points could be even further away from Madrid and Girona.