If Lionel Messi can’t provide, where are Barcelona’s leaders?

“A failure without excuses,” shouted the cover of Catalan daily Sport on Wednesday morning, with the words “debacle”, “lamentable” and “elimination” also featuring in bold print.

The “elimination” in question was, of course, Barcelona exiting the Champions League the previous night, with a shock 3-0 defeat at Roma seeing them crash out on away goals.

It was quite a contrast to Tuesday’s Sport front page — which read “time for the semis already” amid a debate inside over the merits of facing Spanish rivals Real Madrid in the last four or in the final in Kiev.