FCBARCELONA.CAT

16.08.2007 11:04

Working in the rain

Marc Guillén / Jordi Clos

FC Barcelona's squad returned to training on Thursday morning, only hours after arriving back from Germany where they played Bayern Munich in the Franz Beckenbauer Cup.

Frank Rijkaard's players hardly had time to savour their victory, thanks to a Leo Messi strike, before they were continuing pre-season training in the rain on the pitch in front of la Masia.

Absentees

Sylvinho returned to full training after missing out in the trip to Munich, but several players were absent. Gianluca Zambrotta was out with a throat infection, Lilian Thuram had a knock on his left foot and Maxi López has tonsillitis, while Eidur Gudjohnsen was only able to stay out for 25 minutes.

Short session

After going through the usual warm-up routines and physical exercises, the players that appeared for the full 90 minutes against Bayern were allowed to return to the dressing rooms to change. The rest of the squad finished the session with an eight-against-eight game in increasingly heavy rain.