Pep Guardiola is taking all of the fit first team players he has to London for the first leg of the Champions League encounter with Arsenal. Thiago is also picked, but Puyol and Jeffren are out through injury.
Full squad
The players in the FC Barcelona party for the game with Arsenal are: Valdés, Pinto, Adriano, Alves,
Piqué, Maxwell, Milito, Abidal, Sergio Busquets, Xavi, Iniesta, Keita, Messi, Bojan, Afellay,
Pedro, Villa, Mascherano and Thiago.
In an unusual move, although the game is in
London, Pep
Guardiola decided that the pre-game training session would take place at home,
with the first quarter of an hour open to the media. So on Tuesday the first team trained as usual
on pitch number one at the
Ciutat Esportiva.
All 18 of the available first team players were present, while the injured Carles
Puyol and
Jeffren Suárez were elsewhere as they continue their recovery programmes.
Thiago joins in
This was basically the squad that will be travelling to the English
capital later today, but they were joined by Barça B’s
Thiago Alcántara, who is also in Tuesday’s squad, and for the second half of
the session by other reserves in Marc
Muniesa,
Víctor Vázquez and Marc
Bartra.
Lunch and London
Once the session had concluded, the Barça squad had lunch at the Ciutat Esportiva
Joan Gamper before going off to catch their flight to London, which leaves at 4.00 pm and touches
down at 5.50 pm, local time. The players will then be transferred to their hotel, although Pep
Guardiola and Andrés
Iniesta will first be going to the
Emirates Stadium for the pre-match press conferences at 7.50 pm (local time).