Barcelona are not the favourites for the Champions League. The 30-year-old midfielder, who joined the club this summer from Manchester City after the Catalans clinched back-to-back La Liga titles, stressed that raw talent alone will not bridge the gap between domestic supremacy and continental triumph.
“The Champions League is possible, but I do not think we are the favourites,” Rodri told Mundo Deportivo. “We have to understand where we have come from and what is required to become champions. This team still needs to correct several things before it can become a champion.”
Recent European outings have laid bare those margins. Barcelona’s exits at the hands of Inter Milan and Atletico Madrid were defined by defensive frailties and costly disciplinary lapses. In the 2024-25 semifinal, Barcelona scored six goals across two legs against Inter but conceded seven, crashing out 7-6 on aggregate after extra time at the San Siro. A year later, in the 2025-26 quarter-final against Atletico Madrid, Barcelona had a defender sent off in both legs — Pau Cubarsi in the first leg and Eric Garcia in the second — as they fell 3-2 on aggregate to Diego Simeone’s side.
Rodri, whose own career has been shaped by a grueling rehabilitation from an anterior cruciate ligament injury suffered in September 2024, knows better than most what it takes to conquer Europe. The Spain international, who won the Champions League with Manchester City in 2023 and claimed the 2024 Ballon d’Or, endured an 18-month road to full recovery that included a premature comeback at the FIFA Club World Cup and subsequent hamstring and groin setbacks before returning to consistent form in the second half of last season.
That experience, he suggested, is precisely what Barcelona need to draw upon. “I do not think the Champions League is a competition won by the best team,” Rodri said. “It is about moments and understanding what those moments require. That may be the area in which this team can still improve.”
He pointed to the specific failures that have cost Barcelona in recent knockout ties. “Red cards, penalties and perhaps conceding more goals than we should are all factors that determine whether you qualify or not,” he said. “So perhaps it is better not to be exceptionally good in attack, but to be more consistent and more solid. The teams that managed to win proved that to you. That is the area where we can improve, and I am certain of it.”
Barcelona have not won the Champions League in 12 years, with their last triumph coming in 2015. For a club of their stature, that drought weighs heavily, and Rodri — who lifted the trophy with City — was brought in to help end it. “Players like me came here partly for that reason: to develop and give the team a part that I believe is important for winning very special titles such as the Champions League,” he said.
Yet he was quick to temper expectations, drawing on his own journey as proof that European glory is earned through hard lessons, not assumed by pedigree. “I have always said that before you win, you have to lose and you have to learn,” Rodri said. “Those who managed to win important things know that. I played in the Champions League I do not know how many times before we managed to win it, so I understand that experience brings learning. Players learn year after year.”
For Barcelona, the message is clear: the talent is there, the domestic dominance is established, but the finer details — discipline in decisive moments, defensive solidity, and the wisdom that comes from painful defeats — remain the missing pieces in their pursuit of a sixth European crown.