Rakitic: I learnt the style and I put in metres, metres and metres

A few days before facing his Barcelona team-mates when Croatia meet Spain in the European Championships, Ivan Rakitic spoke to Marca about his role in Luis Enrique's team and reflected on the season. 

Individual evolution: I think that I've improved in all aspects since I joined Barça. On a professional level, it's been two impressive years. There are very few things in the team I can improve. Iniesta, Leo, Busi, Masche, before that Xavi... they're personalities that help you grow.  

Role at Barcelona: With the quality that we have up front, you have to help them always be in their perfect moment. If we don't, we lose strength as a group. I'm proud to be behind those three [the MSN] in goals because I like to get forward. I learnt the style and I put in metres, metres and metres. And I do it because [the MSN] pay you back later. 

Messi: It's not important to run for the sake of it, but to run well. That Leo runs two kilometres more in the statistics is not going to help us. He helps us in the situations when he can do damage, because he understands the game well and he knows when he has to run and what he has to do in each moment. Our style is based a lot on him. 

Crisis of results and Champions League KO: You can call it what you want. Football is not always that easy. The important thing is that we always believe in our ideas. If Griezmann's great header hadn't been so perfect and didn't go in, everything would have changed, because we had the game controlled. And there's a penalty in the 93rd minute not given. In the end, they are the details which went us against us. When we say this team can improve, we refer to those things. And we have drawn plenty of conclusions. 

The double: It shows we had a great season, which will give us strength for next season, when the big objective will be to win the Champions League again. 

Iniesta: To talk about Andres you have to go on Google and find the best adjectives. I've never seen anyone like him, as a player and a person. Spectacular. In the games when there is most pressure on Barça, he's always there as our captain. We trust him 100 per cent.