The fall of Barcelona

[brokencrossbar1]

This whole clamour for Xavi is mad too. Given the state they are in, you would imagine someone with a bit of sense would advise them to get a top quality manager who has proven credentials.  Xavi has done or shown nothing to suggest he will do any better than the previous failures.

Like who?

That's it, they have become a bit of a basket club these days and I'm not sure anyone will be breaking the door down to manage them. It is likely it will be a former great who feels loyalty to them, a Xavi or the likes. Start a rebuild process which wa a always gonna have to happen post Messi

[nrico2006]

This whole clamour for Xavi is mad too. Given the state they are in, you would imagine someone with a bit of sense would advise them to get a top quality manager who has proven credentials.  Xavi has done or shown nothing to suggest he will do any better than the previous failures.

Like who?

Who do you want me to name?  Point is, there are lots of managers out there who have more pedigree than Xavi.  For some reason they expect Xavi to fix everything, when they should really go for someone tried and tested at such a critical time.

[rodney trotter]

They are bringing in Xavi as he's a club legend and cheaper option. They don't have the funds to pay someone like Conte 20 million a year like Spurs.

[Bord na Mona man]

You'd have to worry about the state of a club that hired Ronald Koeman to manage them.

[Captain Obvious]

You'd have to worry about the state of a club that hired Ronald Koeman to manage them.

Barcelona have the tradition of appointing ex players as managers. Xavi the latest it seems.

[Rossie11]

Playing a certain style of football is almost more important than winning at Barcelona, thus there hasn't been an Italian manager there in over 50years.
You could say Koeman had more pedigree than Xavi having won titles in Holland but he was always going to be a disaster.
The job is too big a role for most managers in the world, Pep and Enrique both got burnt out in the end despite the successes

Xavi (if he gets the job) is not expected to fix everything. Far from it. But he will be given time to improve things as he will be seen as doing the right things by the club for the
long term future rather than an outsider who will be expected to fix things quickly which is currently impossible.

Its going to be a slow build and Xavi will focus more on the Masia and developing the young talent they have, he will get the team playing the Barca way and get the fans back in the stadium
If he can do that it should be classed as a success as they are in a terrible spot at the moment

If Madrid tried to hatch a plan to destroy Barca they could not have done as good a job as Rosell and Bartomeu have done the last 10 years

[toby47]

Reports are suggesting Aguero might have to retire.

[nrico2006]

Resigning Dani Alves too.

[quit yo jibbajabba]

Bringin the band back together 😃
Thiago linked too.

Tough luck on Aguero for the club and him obvs

[gawa316]

In the Europa now

[sid waddell]

I do hate saying "I told you so" but I told you so (apart from the bit about La Liga being a duopoly, it's not even that now).

La Liga and all the other major continental European leagues are fucked.

The Premier League is the only game in town.

If Real go through then you'd wonder have they enough hunger to win another?

It looks like Real are in Fergie/Cody time.
Which would mean we don't see them again for a good while after this year or next year
Which wouldn't be unbearable

You're off your rocker if you think Real fûcking Madrid won't be there or thereabouts every year.

Empires can quickly come to an end.

Where are AC Milan now? What happened to Serie A's empire?

England has already hoovered up Europe's best coaches.

When Messi and Ronaldo go, and that's not far away, it mightn't be long until the world's best players all decide to make England their destination of choice rather than Spain.

England already has six clubs who are world brands and mostly 50k plus stadiums filled every week. In a few years' time that will be seven or eight clubs with 60k plus stadiums filled every week.

La Liga will continue to be a duopoly.

Real Madrid didn't win a European Cup between 1966 and 1998 and reached one final in those 32 years.

It took them another 12 years to get back to a final after 2002. They tend to make hay when they're good but more often than not they haven't been that great at European level and Spain's production line of players could easily dry up. It's not even a decade since Liverpool completely demolished them over two legs in the last 16 of the Champions League. Dortmund were demolishing them more recently than that again.

Serie A hoovered up the world's best players for over 20 years and AC Milan hoovered up the world's best players for over a decade. Not anymore.

Things don't stay still forever and the dominance they and Barcelona have enjoyed at European level is likely to end sooner rather than later - Barcelona's period at the top of European football already looks over.

If Real go through then you'd wonder have they enough hunger to win another?

It looks like Real are in Fergie/Cody time.
Which would mean we don't see them again for a good while after this year or next year
Which wouldn't be unbearable

You're off your rocker if you think Real fûcking Madrid won't be there or thereabouts every year.

Empires can quickly come to an end.

Where are AC Milan now? What happened to Serie A's empire?

Serie A went bankrupt FFS. That's hardly going to happen to Real.

The decline of Serie A should be a warning to La Liga as to what can happen. The Premier League in general is a much more attractive product than La Liga, which is almost totally about the Madrid-Barcelona rivalry, and since 2009 about the Messi-Ronaldo rivalry. It also happened to coincide with Spain having their greatest ever team at international level, with Xavi, Iniesta, Pique and Busquets being on the opposite side to Ramos, Casillas, Alonso etc in derbies.

Serie A had the Maradona v Gullit/Van Basten/Rijkaard v Matthaus/Klinsmann/Brehme narrative in the late 80s and early 90s which made it compelling. The other backdrop was Italy having a brilliant national team at the time with players like Baresi, Maldini, Baggio and Vialli, and hosting the World Cup. Once that narrative went, it wasn't as attractive.

The Messi v Ronaldo rivalry will soon be gone and the 2010 Spain players are either gone or near the end. The compelling nature of the Barcelona v Madrid rivalry is likely to decline with it, at least as far as the rest of the world is concerned.

[Maroon Manc]

Barca generate more revenue then any PL clubs, the issue is they've wasted it even more-so then United which takes some doing.

They'll be back but its going to take a bit longer then they'd hoped.

[nrico2006]

Barca generate more revenue then any PL clubs, the issue is they've wasted it even more-so then United which takes some doing.

They'll be back but its going to take a bit longer then they'd hoped.

Financially they are in turmoil though.  Not a straightforward road back.

[toby47]

​​​​​​​Barcelona have agreed a deal that could total £55m with Manchester City to sign Ferran Torres.

The Spanish side will pay an initial £46.7m (€55m) plus a further £8.5m (€10m) in add-ons. Some £5.9m (€7m) of those add-ons are said to be more or less guaranteed.

It means City will have made at least £27m (€32m) on a player they paid Valencia around £20m (€23m) for in 2020.

They have not paid any of the agreed add-ons to Valencia due to the limited time he has spent at the Etihad.

Barcelona regard Torres as one of Spain's rising talents and have money to spend in January after recently receiving sizeable investment via a bank loan.

[Armagh18]

How the feck are Barca getting a loan...