Xavi is not expecting Getafe to sit back at Camp Nou when they face his Barcelona side on Saturday.

Nothing else but three points will do for Barca if they are to keep their flagging La Liga title hopes alive, as they trail their bitter rivals Real Madrid by eight points with 13 games to go.

Xavi, who will leave his position as head coach at the end of the season after a difficult campaign, does not think a win will be easily achieved by his team against a Getafe side who occupy 10th spot.

“Getafe are not a defensive team, they are a brave team,” he said at his pre-match press conference on Friday.

“They press very high up the pitch and they have picked up points at some tricky away grounds. They always compete and (coach Jose) Bordalas always gets the most out of his players, and that is worthy of praise.

“The points are very important for the battle for the league title. As long as we are mathematically involved, we will fight for it. Each week is a different story. We can’t drop points, less so at home.

“We would go to be in second place in the table (above Girona) and that will put more pressure on Girona and Real Madrid, who play later. We are not throwing in the towel, even though we know that it will be tough.”

Barcelona come into the match after a 1-1 draw away to Napoli in the first leg of their Champions League last 16 tie on Wednesday.

“We will see how we come into the game, but it is the moment for the best players,” Xavi added.

“We will make some changes but not many, because it is a vital match. It would have been better to play on Sunday or Monday but that is no excuse.”

Barcelona are without Alejandro Balde (hamstring), who is sidelined for the rest of the season, while Marcos Alonso remains unavailable due to lower back pain, which has meant Joao Cancelo being forced to play at left-back.

“He is playing very well both on the left and on the right, his contribution is fantastic,” Xavi said about Cancelo.

“The instructions I give him are because sometimes he plays too high or too low. Also because he is closer to the bench for me (to communicate with). But he is a leader too, we are very happy with him.”

Argentinian superstar Lionel Messi became the first player to score 400 goals in one of Europe’s top five leagues on this day in 2019.

Messi reached the landmark in his 435th league game for Barcelona, a 3-0 win against Eibar at Camp Nou in a season where he would win his 10th and final La Liga title.

“The figures speak for themselves,” Messi’s coach at the time, Ernesto Valverde, said after the match.

“We don’t know if anyone will ever get close to those statistics but he is unbelievable.”

Cristiano Ronaldo, who throughout his career has vied with Messi to be regarded as the greatest player of their generation, was the first to score 400 goals in Europe’s top five leagues.

The Portuguese star reached the landmark in October 2018 but it took him 63 more appearances to achieve it, and his goals were spread across the English, Spanish and Italian top flights.

At the time Messi reached 400 goals, he had scored 31 hat-tricks for Barcelona, including four occasions where he scored four.

By the time Messi announced his departure from Barcelona in an emotional farewell in August 2021, he had scored an all-time record 474 La Liga goals.

Salary restrictions meant Barca could not afford to keep him, and he moved on to Paris St Germain before joining Inter Miami last summer.

Messi sealed his legacy as one of the all-time greats by leading Argentina to World Cup glory in Qatar in 2022.