Soccer: Xavi warns Barcelona's rivals - We'll get better

Jose Mourinho went back to work yesterday after receiving more bad news from Barcelona - according to Xavi, the Spanish champions are still getting better and better.

This could only compound the Portuguese's frustration after learning of his two-match ban and €40,000 ($70,000) fine for the red cards earned purposefully by his players in the Champions League last week.

One of those matches is suspended, however, so Mourinho will only have to sit out one the irrelevant Auxerre match.

Xabi Alonso and Sergio Ramos, who earned the late red cards, were also fined €20,000 each, while Iker Casillas and Jerzy Dudek were fined €10,000 and €5000 respectively for their roles in the incident.

The scorer of the first goal in Tuesday's massacre said the victory was a new high but that there was still so much more that a team now being talked about as the best in history could achieve.

"We are playing better than in our first season [under Guardiola]," Xavi said. "And although we have won a lot of trophies, there are still a lot left for us to win."

He swerved questions over his team's place in the all-time pecking order but the 5-0 thrashing has Barcelona fans struggling to think of a better group of players.

"The 6-2 win [in May last year] at the Bernabeu was a perfect result but this is even better because of the way we played," Xavi added. "It was an incredible feeling to be so superior to them. It feels great to be a Barcelona fan right now, and they [the Madrid players] must be feeling terrible."

The Barca midfielder is now favourite to win European Footballer of the Year next month and he added: "If I or Andres [Iniesta] win the award then it will be an award for the philosophy of this fantastic club and for the style of play that we have been practising for the last 30 years."

One man who will not be on Fifa's top table is Cristiano Ronaldo who once again failed to score against the Gerard Pique-Carles Puyol combination. When Barca beat Almeria 8-0 last week Ronaldo was asked if he thought the win would affect the Clasico, to which he replied: "Let's see if they can score eight past us."

No one could have imagined how close they would come as they inflicted the heaviest defeat of Mourinho's career.

Last night the Portuguese received support from the club's director general Jorge Valdano who said: "We can use the game to learn important lessons and to mature. We have to accept the defeat and carry on and hopefully in the second half of the season when the two teams meet again it will be us giving the exhibition.

"He [Mourinho] was impeccable in the way he conducted himself during the match. Madrid is a club of men and we will act as such, all working together - players and coach - to make sure we come out of this."

Mourinho's side face Valencia on Saturday and will be without the suspended Sergio Ramos and Ricardo Carvalho and the injured Gonzalo Higuain.

Supporters have sung Mourinho's name recently but this weekend's welcome may not be so warm.

Yesterday Madrid fans had to suffer the replays of the five goals scored against them; the roar that reached 160 decibels inside the Nou Camp when the first goal went in; and the 26-pass move that led to the second goal.

They had believed Mourinho would end Pep Guardiola's domination of Spanish football's most famous fixture but the Barca coach's balance now stands at five games played, five won, with 16 goals scored and only two conceded.

- Independent