'Relying on Messi is normal'

With the Argentine due to miss several weeks of action after suffering a fractured arm during Saturday's victory over Sevilla, all eyes are naturally on how the Catalans will get by without their star man, not that Valverde is overly concerned.

"It doesn't bother me to talk about 'Messi-dependence' because he's the best we've seen, so it's normal to depend on Messi. Now, between all of us we have to make sure that his absence is noticed as little as possible," the Barca boss insisted ahead of Tuesday's visit of Inter Milan.

Valverde's message was clear as he challenged his players to step up and prove themselves in Messi's absence.

"It's very difficult for all the reponsibility to fall on a single player, we need to make a big effort as a team to make sure his absence is noticed as little as possible. We have the players to do that, but everyone needs to step up," he explained..

When asked if Messi would be missed, Valverde responded in jest. "No, not at all," he joked. "Of course he'll be missed, but we have to get through our next few games without Leo. We're very happy after beating Sevilla. We want to miss him whilst we're winning."

However, Valverde was not giving anything away with regard to Messi's replacement. "There are plenty of options [to replace Messi]. Either by changing players or by changing the style of play. I'm sure you're all speculating, the opposition will be too, I'm not going to reveal anything today," he teased.

Finally, the Barca's chief ended the interview by admitting that Messi looks likely to be out for closer to a month than the original diagnosis of two to three weeks. "It's true that three weeks was mentioned. you always hope to have players back as quickly as possible, but it doesn't look like things will be that way," he admitted.