For Barcelona coach Hansi Flick, the early red card against Eric García was the turning point in the 2-1 defeat to Monaco on Thursday and he stressed that his team was strong enough to progress in the revamped Champions League.

García was the last to be sent off for a foul after just 10 minutes before goals from Maghnes Akliouche and George Ilenikhena, either side of Lamine Yamal’s equaliser, earned the Ligue 1 side three points at the Stade Louis II.

For Barça, this was the first defeat under Flick after an impressive start to the season that had resulted in five consecutive victories in LaLiga.

“I think we defended with a lot of passion,” the German coach said in a post-match press conference. “Lamine’s goal brought us back to 1-1. We had chances. In the end we tried to stay in the game with a compact defense, close together, but you can also see that (Monaco) brings in a lot of players with enormous speed. It was not easy to defend.”

“After the red card, the game changed completely. The positive thing is that we tried to defend as a team and attack as a team. We had chances, but they deserved the 2-1, so we have to accept that.”

“I’m not worried. We have to analyse it, but I’m telling the team now: ‘chin up’ because they were a little disappointed in the dressing room.”

Barça will host Young Boys in its next Champions League match on October 1st and will have to play against Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund, Benfica and Atalanta, among others, in this competition.

Under the new format, the top eight teams from the league phase advance directly to the round of 16, while teams ranked 9th to 24th advance to a knockout round and twelve teams are eliminated.

Despite the opening defeat against Monaco, Flick has no doubts that Barça will qualify for the next round.

“No,” he replied when asked if Thursday’s defeat was further proof that Barça have a problem with the Champions League, having failed to reach the knockout stages in two of the last three years.

“Look at the situation today. The red card after 10 minutes. That completely changed our idea, our game plan. We have to accept that. These things happen.”

“I think we are strong enough to play a good Champions League. We have seven games and I think we will win a lot of games and achieve our goals in the end.”

The game changed when García brought down Takumi Minamino after the former Liverpool striker intercepted a short pass from Barça goalkeeper Marc-André ter Stegen in the early stages of the match. Ter Stegen said the error was due to a misunderstanding between the two and felt Barça deserved a point.

“Yes, definitely (the red card affected the game),” he told reporters. “There was a misunderstanding in that situation. I feel sorry for Eric because it cost him his life. Then we have to play 80 minutes with one player less.”

“It shouldn’t have happened, but in football it happens from time to time. It hurts because even with ten men we showed up.”

“We didn’t have the game under control, but we managed it. In the end we lost by one goal, the second came out of nowhere and wasn’t really deserved at that moment.”

One of the positive aspects of the defeat for Barça was the return of Ansu Fati, who made his first appearance of the season after an injury.

“I saw him in the last few weeks of training and also at the beginning of preseason, and he was completely different,” said Flick.

“I spent some time at Brighton last season and saw him in training and in a game. Here he is completely different. He is focused and brings his quality onto the pitch. He needs some time now, but he will manage.”

At 17 years and 40 days old when he scored against Inter Milan in 2019, Fati is still the youngest goalscorer in the Champions League. However, he watched from the bench as his teammate Yamal became the second-youngest goalscorer in the competition at 17 years and 68 days.

Yamal has now scored four goals and provided four assists in six games in all competitions this season, which has led to opposition teams starting to double-team him or treat him differently. As a result, Flick took him off early in Monaco to rest him for Sunday’s match against Villarreal in LaLiga.

“Lamine tried a lot today,” explained Flick. “It was a tough game for him, they attacked him really hard. That’s how it is. He has to adapt to it. It was also important for Pau (Cubarsí) and him to think about Sunday.”