Luis Enrique: I don´t mind where we play

Luis Enrique refused to be drawn into the controversy surrounding the staging of the Copa del Rey final and insisted he does not mind “when or where” his team play.

The venue for the final against Alaves is yet to be decided but Real Madrid have already ruled out the Santiago Bernabeu, with president Florentino Perez explaining on Thursday it is because “there’s work going on”.

Perez’s stance comes 12 months after he deemed the Bernabeu unusable due to a scheduling conflict with a Bruce Springsteen concert and has inevitably drawn accusations the LaLiga leaders do not want their arch rivals to play a major final at their home ground.

Luis Enrique was asked about it prior to Saturday’s Liga clash against Alaves but opted against adding to the narrative.

He told a news conference: “This comes up every year. I understand what each club has to say, it’s not something I worry about.

“I don’t mind when we play or where we play.”

The Barcelona boss was equally cautious when he was asked why the club decided to appeal the yellow cards shown to Luis Suarez – his second of the night – and Sergio Busquets in the second leg of the Copa del Rey semi-final against Atletico Madrid on Tuesday but not the straight red issued to Sergio Roberto.

“I don’t like being drawn into controversy and I don’t really want to have to answer that, I’m not much of a fan of creating a polemic, that’s your [the journalists’] job,” he said.

“My job is to improve the team and get football results.”

That job continues on Saturday when Barca visit the Estadio de Mendizorroza knowing a win would move them above Madrid, for a few hours at least, with Zinedine Zidane’s side not kicking off until later in the day at Osasuna.

The postponing of Madrid’s game at Celta Vigo last weekend means they head into the weekend with two games in hand and Luis Enrique is more concerned with how the table looks in May.

He said: “It [the table] is not important at all.

“I want to be leaders after 38 games when no other teams can win any more points. Obviously we’ve talked about our situation, we need to win points to improve it.”