I think BBZ was a Barca fan, but as his love for his compatriot Rakitic grew more and more, it skewed everything.
From then on, his opinions became more about overtly and covertly aggrandising Rakitic's good performances and exempting him from blame completely when he plays badly (which happens fairly frequently). I think he basically watches Barca through Rakitic's boots nowadays.
Hence he hated Arthur even before last summers pre-season, because the more minutes Arthur plays, the more likely Rakitic will be out the team eventually. He's bashed Busquets, Vidal, Roberto, and over this summer, even Messi to paper over the cracks of Rakitic's ever exapanding footballing deficiencies.
I have a feeling BBZ will be a lot more rational once Rakitic finally leaves. Or maybe he'll do a Mandrake and make an account wherever Rakitic goes. So perhaps ForzaInter will be getting an illustrious new member soon.
It is not about Rakitic.
Each of us is a different person.
You have on this page a user JCar who says:
Barcelona is not about winning, is about HOW we win.
I could be wrong, but during 90s, I have never heard this moto regarding our club.
Yes, we did play beautiful, but imo, during Pep's era, fans, media and the board started to create some motos and myths and now people think that this is how we worked since always.
Iirc, it was 2009, when our twitter page made that joke about Rm, something along the lines: we create our players, they are buying their players.
Now, it was just a media battle, banter and trolling.
Since anyone who has followed Barca pre Pep, like in 90s and 00s, knows that Real and Barca were always among top3 crazy spenders in the world.
I mean, in 2000-2001, we sold Figo for around 100-120M in a current era.
And we bought Saviola for 100-150M (translated in today's worth of Euros), Gerard Lopez for 100-ish M and Geovanni Deiberson for 120M.
Even old winger Overmars was something like 70-80M today.
So, basically, that is like buying Coutinho, Dembele, Sane and old Willian today.
Ronaldinho, Etoo, those were all 100M transfers.
Ibrahimovic today would have been a 150-200M transfer.
My point:
Everyone who followed Barca longer knows that we were always filthy rich and that we were crazy spenders, just like RM
Our 2 clubs were always drunk millionaires.
And then, in 2006, we managed to have Messi, Xavi and Iniesta in the same time and we stopped spending like crazy because we have hit a lottery prize from our La Masia.
And then some idiot on Barca's twitter writes a trolling post how we are actually creating and not buying players, and then a new generation of younger fans start to buy those ideas as serious and then you have millions of kids who actually believe:
= Barca are good guys, Real are bad guys
= we are creating players, they are the opposite=they are crazy spenders
So, that is a lie.
And people who believe in this are either kids or deluded and living in a dreamland.
Some guys will get mad now, but the funny thing is: during 2000s, when Real won 3 CLs in 1998, 2000 and 2002, we had ZERO domestic players in our team.
Fans were pissed because we were losing touch with Catalonia.
Van Gaal was a coach and we had 10+ Dutch players in our team.
Then fans and media started to ask for more local players and this is why Xavi and Puyol were given chances back then, only so that fans would be happier.
So, around 1998-2002, we had only Xavi and Puyol in our team from domestic players.
While Real Madrid, who are supposed to be bad guys and "opposite to our way of creating players" actually had: Raul from their youth academy, Iker Casillas, Guti, Raul Bravo and Francisco Pavon.
They actually had an idea called "Zidanes and Pavons" back then where they wanted to have:
5 galactico signings like R9, Zidane, Figo, Beckham, Roberto Carlos, paired with 5 domestic players like Raul, Guti, Casillas, Pavon etc.
So, Real had a team consisted of almost 50:50 superstars and local players.
While Barca had 23 expensive Dutch and Brasilian players and 2 kids.
Now, when you remove Barca's glasses, does this sound as if Barca are "good guys" here and Real are "bad guys"?
I am not RM's fan.
I am just trying to explain how bullshit and childish are some ideas thrown on this forum.
And majority of those ideas and motos surfaced during Pep's era.
So, a few crazy lies:
1. Barca is creating players, and Real is buying players, while we are actually the same.
2. La Masia is golden and totally different from all youth academies in the world. Seriously, does that make any sense?
Ok, there are some nice ideas at La Masia, but do you guys think that coaches and scouts at RM, Man Utd (who had a the best generation from their academy in late 90s, similar to Barca during Pep), Bayern, Juve, Liverpool are idiots and that they never had an idea=oh, let's do the same what coaches are doing in a magical La Masia?
So, the more realistci answer is: La Masia is awesome, but it is similar to youth academies from all big clubs.
The only difference is that we cheated on transfers in early 00s, and we bought the highest amount of highly rated kids from all around the world (Messi, Kubo, Simmons etc), which was not allowed.
We escaped with Messi and some kids.
But then the other clubs made an appeal that we are cheating and buying more foreign kids than it is allowed, and we got punished.
We are not allowed to cheat and buy as many foreign kids anymore. And what is happening? = as expected, we aren't producing 10s of superkids anymore.
Our fans don't want to hear that we cheated, or that we were just lucky with Xavi and Iniesta.
It is more fancy to live in a dreamland how=La Masia is different than all other academies in the world.
Well, La Masia was shit in 90s, in early 00s, and in the last 10 years.
It was awesome only for 5-6 years around Pep'e era (and with Messi, Xavi, Iniesta).
When you sum it all, which is more likely:
1) La Masia is really magical?
2) or this is an urban myth created by media and younger fans who started to follow Barca during Pep's era and who believed in those fairytales?
3. a lie no3, I have personally NEVER heard in 90s and early 00s that it is about HOW we are winning.
Well, of course, it is always nicer to BOTH play nice and win.
But if you win even with playing ugly or if you are lucky, who cares?
But then, during Pep, suddenly this idea emerged in media: we are Barca, we are different. It is not about titles, it is about our style. Wins without style are not real wins.
Ok, again, to some extent we always wanted to play nice. But during Pep and after Pep, this moto went into extremes.
And suddenly fans don't want to watch matches if we are not playing in an orgasmic way.
Then you guys wonder why I am not shitting on EV and his ugly play.
Well, again, I was a fan in 90s and 00s.
I had watched a similar football for 15 years.
Remember that Barca was knocked out 3 times in a group stage of a CL in 90s.
Or that we haven't won a single title for 5 years in early 00s.
So, if I have survived 5 years with zero titles, a horrible football and horrible transfers, then for me: watching EV winning La Ligas with an ugly football is really not the end of the world.
Being 5 years without titles and BOTH playing horrible is way worse than banging La Ligas for fun.
Also, I see that Crujff's name is thrown a lot here.
As if Crujff's teams played the best and the most efficient football ever.
I don't know whether younger fans actually know, but this is how we won titles with Crujff's "super efficient" football:
1992:
Real Madrid was a leader with +1 point advantage (victory was worth 2 points back then, not 3 points) before the last round, and they played against Tenerife away.
Real was actually leading 0:2 in the first half and take a look how Crujff and Barca won a title in the end:
Then, the next season. A similar story.
Before the last round, Real AGAIN had +1 point advantage and AGAIN had to play at Tenerife in the last round.
Barca played at home vs Sociedad.
Look again what happened and who ended as a champion:
Then, in the next season in 1994.
Again the SAME STORY.
Deportivo had 55 points before the last round.
Barca had 54 points.
Deportivo played vs Valencia in the last round.
Barca played at home vs Sevilla.
Look at who ended as a champion:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OuXEsqOa-Lk
So, here is a brief history of Barcelona since 1899:
La Liga titles:
1929'
--
1945, 48, 49
1952, 53, 58, 59
1960
1974
1985
Crujff 1991, 92, 93, 94
Van Gaal 1998, 99
Rijkaard 2005, 06
Pep 2009, 10, 11
Tito 2013
Lucho 2015, 16
EV 2018, 19
So, a short resume:
From 1961 to 1991, we won only 2 titles in 30 years.
So, we surely weren't giants or played better than EV in that era.
Then in 90s, Crujff came.
And as seen on videos from above, he won 3 out of 4 titles in the last round, when each time his opponents chocked in the last round.
Then Van Gaal won 2 La ligas, but was getting KO'd in a group stage of a CL every time.
Then we were absolute shit in early 2000s for 5 years.
Then we were good for 2-3 years under Rijkaard.
And 3 years under Pep.
Now, I would like to ask you:
If our ONLY dominant years in our 120 years long history were:
2006 under Rijkaard
And 2008-2011 under Pep
And maybe 2015 under Lucho
Then how on Earth cam people throw these childish phrases like: it is about HOW we win, not about titles?
Lol, we won 2 titles in 30 years from 1960 to 1991.
Do you think that fans were saying in those days: we don't want titles unless if we are playing beautiful?
We were an absolute shit back then.
Then under Crujff, we played nice, but as you see, we weren't that efficient in terms of points.
We won 3 titles with an insane luck.
Imagine if EV would win a title in the last round, after Deportivo would miss a pen in the 94th minute.
People would ask for sacking right away.
So, no offense to anyone, but when I see people throwing around phrases like:
1. we don't buy players, we create players
2. La Masia is golden
3. and it is not about wins, but about HOW we win
= I can't help to roll my eyes and ask: mate, let me guess. You are either a teen or in early 20s and you started to watch Barca during Pep and you believe in these new gen phrases?
Not to mention that priorities of fans who started to watch Barca during Pep are different than guys who watched Barca from 1960-1990 when we won 2 La ligas and 0 Cls, lol.
And for the end, since I am coming from an older era and I have watched Barca in 90s and 00s when we were a crap, I am not that much into this: it is about HOW we win "mode".
Even though, this would be my pick also:
1. winning and playing nice
If not possible, then:
2. winning with an ugly play
3. playing beautiful and not win is not an option for me.
Now when you know this back story, you will understand that my views on Barca and my history with Barca are different.
I am personally all about titles and efficiency.
Then you will understand why I hate guys like Neymar who is more show than actual end product.
I am all about end product, and not about tricks for fans and youtube.
For the same reason, you will understand why I dislike Dembele: too many tricks, low end product.
Also, you will understand why I like ugly players like Rakitic or Paulinho.
they may play ugly, but as long as they are scoring goals, making tackles and as long as a team is winning, I am fine with them.
Also, I hate when other fans come and preach: why are you Barca's fan? Since Barca is all about playing beautiful.
Again, go back and read this post about a short history of Barca.
In 120 years, we had like 100 years of misery, 15 years of ok results like Lucho, Van Gaal and EV.
And 5 glorious years: Pep, Lucho, Rijkaard and Crujff (even though he won a CL from a lucky extra time free kick and won every title in a lucky way, but ok).
