10 - Lionel Messi - v5

[DonAK]

Bring back midfield interplay also. It's not named a trio simply because there are 3 players in it. Midfield trio means exactly that, a trio of rectangles based on movement exploiting pockets of space with each move being complemented by a team reaction as to maintain shape and provide quick passing options. This is the only way to destabilize opponents who will mark our players with more zealousness as we move up the ladder in key competitions. But if we move, and if we are quick, we can find a way forward even while outnumbered. Because if we move and pass well enough, we'll find that 2-3 players from the other team are marking thin air more and more as they become unable to track our movements. All hope is lost though if we look dead slow and unable to do anything to get off marking.

Last game when we actually had a midfield trio in the truest sense was the 4-0 with Milan 5 years ago. Or you could make a case for the 4-3 win on Bernabeu with Martino (Xavi). Basically when Xavi was gone so was our midfield fluidity, which makes me think that maybe he was even more influential than the managers post Pep, because we kept components from Pep's game years after he left through Xavi.

Xavi is the best and most influential Spanish footballer in history.

Look at the Spanish NT when he started declining. Barcelona suffered too.

 

[BBZ8800]

Our midfield is currently a quantity over quality matter. In reality only Busquets and Iniesta (occasionally) are up to the standard to be a true world class starting midfielder for Barca.
Rakitic is decent but not real world class level. We are lacking real creativity in midfield. I’m confident Coutinho will keep improving but we need one more apart from him.
Plus we’ve got some dead wood to get rid off too.

We had 3 world class players in midfield ONLY when we hit a lottery with Xavi-Iniesta-Busquets.

Other than that, for 99% of our 120 years long history, we had some world class players and others okish players in midfield.
In 1992's final, a midfield: Laudrup, Guardiola, Bakero, Eusebio, Juan Carlos had 1 and a half world class players in Laudrup and Bakero.
In 2006, we played with Edmilson, Van Bommel, Deco. Van Bommel was Rakitic's type, and Edmilson was a Brasilian-workhorse with Brasilian technique, but miles from Busquets.

My point:
The same as how we learned that we'll never hit a jackpot with La Masia ever again, maybe we should lower a bar in terms of our midfield quality.
Coutinho-Rakitic-Busi is probably (my wild guess) is probably better midfield than 90% of midfields in our history.

I mean, if you guys think that a current midfield sucks, prepare yourself for rocky years once when we'll need to buy 2-3-4 new attackers when Messi will be gone and when we'll play with random players like Mane, Sane, Dembele and similar.

Imo, our midfield is not bad.
it is bad if you compare it with Pep's era.
But imo, Pep's era, Xavi and Messi should be excluded from all debates on Barca's forum.
Those were the days when we had cheating codes and it will repeat never again.

 

[fergus90]

We had 3 world class players in midfield ONLY when we hit a lottery with Xavi-Iniesta-Busquets.

Other than that, for 99% of our 120 years long history, we had some world class players and others okish players in midfield.
In 1992's final, a midfield: Laudrup, Guardiola, Bakero, Eusebio, Juan Carlos had 1 and a half world class players in Laudrup and Bakero.
In 2006, we played with Edmilson, Van Bommel, Deco. Van Bommel was Rakitic's type, and Edmilson was a Brasilian-workhorse with Brasilian technique, but miles from Busquets.

My point:
The same as how we learned that we'll never hit a jackpot with La Masia ever again, maybe we should lower a bar in terms of our midfield quality.
Coutinho-Rakitic-Busi is probably (my wild guess) is probably better midfield than 90% of midfields in our history.

I mean, if you guys think that a current midfield sucks, prepare yourself for rocky years once when we'll need to buy 2-3-4 new attackers when Messi will be gone and when we'll play with random players like Mane, Sane, Dembele and similar.

Imo, our midfield is not bad.
it is bad if you compare it with Pep's era.
But imo, Pep's era, Xavi and Messi should be excluded from all debates on Barca's forum.
Those were the days when we had cheating codes and it will repeat never again.

I personally think our midfield needs an injection of pace and creativity, we got over ran a lot away from home by good teams. To be honest Coutinho is starting to look more and more like that player, been getting better with every game.

 

[soul24rage]

play coutinho-busquets-roberto as the midfield. pace, quality, physicality.

 

[CatalinR10]

play coutinho-busquets-roberto as the midfield. pace, quality, physicality.

not gonna work , we need someone who can control the game , roberto is not that. If we use that mid , Messi will continue to come and play deep.

 

[Barca83]

MATS

Semedo
Pique
Umtiti
Alba

Verratti/Arthur/Eriksen/Thiago
Busi
Coutinho

Griezmann
Messi
Demb

 

[booge]

Verratti was a big loss. I would keep Rakatic. It's gomes who needs to get the f*** out!

That guys been a frigging disease.

 

[ASordidGod]

MATS

Semedo
Pique
Umtiti
Alba

Verratti/Arthur/Eriksen/Thiago
Busi
Coutinho

Griezmann
Messi
Demb

Eriksen's not a controlling mid and Arthur's unproven, but yeah, either Verratti or Thiago along with Griezman and Suarez dropped and we're looking good. Too bad it'll never happen. 442 again next season with Suarez undroppable and Gomes and Paulinho as the wingers.

 

[blaug]

play coutinho-busquets-roberto as the midfield. pace, quality, physicality.

Roberto shits himself when teams press him. He can do a job against lower league opposition but in the CL, he will get destroyed

 

[BBZ8800]

I personally think our midfield needs an injection of pace and creativity, we got over ran a lot away from home by good teams. To be honest Coutinho is starting to look more and more like that player, been getting better with every game.

Teams were overrunning us even when we had Pep, Xavi and Iniesta.
Also, all Pep's teams are outplayed in away matches also.

So, maybe it is not about players, but about too attacking formation, 3 midfielders, weak physical skills and similar?

MATS

Semedo
Pique
Umtiti
Alba

Verratti/Arthur/Eriksen/Thiago
Busi
Coutinho

Griezmann
Messi
Demb

I said in a previous post that people are expecting too much.
This post is a good example of that.

Here is what is a problem with these kind of posts:
Coutinho 160 Millions.
Eriksen/Verratti 150-200M.
Busi will soon retire. I guess that people won't want some 20-30M CDM. People will ask for some 100M the best in the world CDM again.

Griezmann 100M.
Dembele 150M.
Messi will be gone soon. I guess that we'll need a new 150-200M guy on his position, way better than Dembele, right?

So, you see, people are suddenly asking for 150M superstars on all 6 midfield-attack positions.
And if we don't have a 150M guy like Eriksen/Verratti but just a 50-60M Rakitic, people say: we suck, we can't play that way. We are way below a world class level.

There is NO WAY that we will buy 150M guys on all 6 positions.
That is not sustainable.

So, basically what some guys here are asking is: we need to have a team which is by far the most superior team on a paper, and then we'll win a CL again.
Again, we never had such a team, except in Pep's era.
But then, we were lucky with La Masia gifts Messi, Xavi, Iniesta and Busi.
This is why I have said that Pep's era should be forgotten and excluded from debates.

Guys, you are asking for way too much.
You need to lower the bar and ask for more realistic signings.

Plus, accept that we will never again be the team with the best players out there.
But "just one" out of 4-5 best teams out there, who have more or less equal qualities where all teams have some pros and cons.

 

[Vilarrubi]

Roberto shits himself when teams press him. He can do a job against lower league opposition but in the CL, he will get destroyed

+1

 

[Kul_z]

Right now, i want to see this line up against celta without messi(one half ffs)

Mats
Semedo vermaelen umtiti alba
Raki paulinho denis
Dembele suarez coutinho

This could be a 4-4-2 aswell so our beloved ev wont go of the grid that much, but right now i think that we should aim at tryouts who deserve the place in this barca team for next season.

 

[RMU ReBorn]

Bring back midfield interplay also. It's not named a trio simply because there are 3 players in it. Midfield trio means exactly that, a trio of rectangles based on movement exploiting pockets of space with each move being complemented by a team reaction as to maintain shape and provide quick passing options. This is the only way to destabilize opponents who will mark our players with more zealousness as we move up the ladder in key competitions. But if we move, and if we are quick, we can find a way forward even while outnumbered. Because if we move and pass well enough, we'll find that 2-3 players from the other team are marking thin air more and more as they become unable to track our movements. All hope is lost though if we look dead slow and unable to do anything to get off marking.

Last game when we actually had a midfield trio in the truest sense was the 4-0 with Milan 5 years ago. Or you could make a case for the 4-3 win on Bernabeu with Martino (Xavi). Basically when Xavi was gone so was our midfield fluidity, which makes me think that maybe he was even more influential than the managers post Pep, because we kept components from Pep's game years after he left through Xavi.

This is the reason why i believe that Xavi was the important player in Pep's system .

 

[Ousmane Dembélé]

Messi was better last season.

He has noticeably declined from his 16/17 form from what I've seen from him so far this season. He shit the bed in the CL last year as well, but he was still better overall.

This is to be expected though. He's at the point where's he going to get worse every year.

14/15 was the last time he looked like he was on another planet from every other footballer alive. I'd still say he's the best now, but his gap at the top isn't as big anymore.

[youtube]Bw5SuPPtcQg[/youtube]

He has peak Neymar and prime Suarez that season, but even with that considered he was still much more of a dynamic player back then than he is now. The thing is that wasn't that long ago and I'd like to see how he would do at RW again.

 

[FCBfan22]

Messi was better last season.

He has noticeably declined from his 16/17 form from what I've seen from him so far this season. He shit the bed in the CL last year as well, but he was still better overall.

This is to be expected though. He's at the point where's he going to get worse every year.

14/15 was the last time he looked like he was on another planet from every other footballer alive. I'd still say he's the best now, but his gap at the top isn't as big anymore.

[youtube]Bw5SuPPtcQg[/youtube]

He has peak Neymar and prime Suarez that season, but even with that considered he was still much more of a dynamic player back then than he is now. The thing is that wasn't that long ago and I'd like to see how he would do at RW again.

With Roberto at RB, Rakitić in RCM and injured Pique, I can guarantee you that it would be horror.