“Yes, as always,” he told a news conference on Saturday when asked if he had president Josep Maria Bartomeu’s support. “I spoke with the president and I have always felt supported by the club. There’s a lot of talk when there’s a blow like that. Everyone staggers.”
When asked how he feels on a personal level, Valverde replied: “It’s like in the film The Great Escape, with Steve McQueen. They catch him every time he tries to escape. I feel the same – it’s like they throw me back in the cell every time I try to forget.
“But I want to play the game against Getafe [on Sunday]. You don’t stop thinking about what happened and why it happened.
“I feel I have the strength to continue. I’m okay, and I want to take a step forward, not hide under a stone.”
“I’ve not seen the game, but I have it clearly in my mind,” he said. “We knew we had to start strong and not concede, and we conceded, but we regrouped. In the second half, the two goals knocked us down onto the canvas. We tried to recover and then an absurd goal happened.
“We’re hurting, I won’t deny it. We have a responsibility to ourselves and to our fans. We can lose a tie, a semi-final with Liverpool, because they are a great team. The problem is how we lost, as we allowed a comeback from such a favourable position.
“It’s hard. It seems like the legs are a little heavier now. What was flowing before now looks different. We have to overcome that.”
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