draconifire
NTC with a Positive attitude
Please no more Brazilian Forwards. The world has seen enough duds and absolute shithousery associated with them.
Barca Transfers and Rumors
- Thread starter LordLichtenstein
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Missed this. I think it's more systematic than anything.
Baena under Xavi? Forget about those stats.
With all the levers?That's political talk for the dumb masses...
It's going to hurt us for sure. Winning the league and getting close to a CL semifinal in the last 2 seasons is very tough to do. There are teams out there that spent over a billion and didn't get close to this type of success.
You can kiss any hope of possibly winning the league again and building on what we did in CL this season if the team gets weaker instead of stronger. That's a given.
If the squad improves, we can continue the good work we've done in the last 2 years. If not the players will stagnate and the development is gonna be minimal. How can you improve at the top if you don't play CL knockout games all the time?
From now the target is to keep making CL knockouts every season. For that to happen we need to at least keep the same squad, if we can't possibly improve it.
Ok so there was a little bit of hyperbole in my post.
Like all tier 1 (1.5 right now I guess) our target will be
LaLiga win or challenge
Copa win or challenge
CL KO rounds and see what happens.
My point is that if push comes to shove, selling a few "starters" for 200m while investing half or less than that will have minimal difference on those targets.
The LaLiga win aside, the output has been average. And even with the LaLiga win, we were already one of the best sides in LaLiga post winter market in Xavi first season. And would have probably mounted a serious challenge and even won it in hindsight, having Dembele/Ferran, Auba, Luuk and Mingueza at RB (biggest Q) instead of what we spent on Raphinha, Lewy and Kounde.
khaled_a_d
Senior Member
Lewa for Auba is the biggest question mark and what if in such scenario IMO.
Raphinha and Kounde has helped us a lot and was reliable starter who were fairly consistent and reliable. Not elite though but reliable big club starter.
Now, Lewa has helped us a lot and you can make an assumption that he was worth every penny when you look at clubs like Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea who would have had a far better season with a clinical 9 like Lewa.
The thing is Auba while inferior to Lewa, he was close enough. In 23 games he scored 13 goals for us in half season, next year Lewa scored 33 in 46. Per 46 games Auba would have 26? that is 7 goal difference which is important but was it worth the difference in price tag (we bought Lewa for 45 and sold Auba for 12, that is 33M difference) and more importantly the difference in wage and contract length?
Now, would Auba kept his form with us or became his EPL version again?
khaled_a_d
Senior Member
There is also plenty of great attacking Brazilian, you just need to pick the right one.
Estevao looked amazing in youth buy is having slow start as a professional in compariso to his teammates Endrick & Guilherme, still he just became 17 a week ago and is slowly intergrated to the team.
He is worth keeping tabs on him, but not doing anything crazy yet
If we don't have the money to compete in Brazil then we shouldn't make offers there.
Estevao price is perhaps getting inflated by having the Vitor Roque agent. There is no way he should cost more than Endrick for example.
I'm not watching that much football these days. But the player I feel we missed out the most on by far is Kendry. And given his talent level, and price point compared to Brazil market, 15m is quite cheap.
Just looks exquisite technically with a knowledge of what to do with the ball. Key Barca traits.
Estevao price is perhaps getting inflated by having the Vitor Roque agent. There is no way he should cost more than Endrick for example.
I'm not watching that much football these days. But the player I feel we missed out the most on by far is Kendry. And given his talent level, and price point compared to Brazil market, 15m is quite cheap.
Just looks exquisite technically with a knowledge of what to do with the ball. Key Barca traits.
serghei
Senior Member
La Liga win aside? That's one of the 2 completed seasons under Xavi so far.
Reaching CL knockouts, let alone quarters with options for semis like this season, is also unlikely if you sell the best players. As is competing for La Liga. Winning it like last season is out of the question.
The output has not been average. Far from it. Output in the last 2 seasons has been good for regular top team standard, and great for a club with Barca's situation.
I'm talking the 3 years of Laporta's term.
The LaLiga win was excellent. Point was that over 3 seasons we have 2nd, 1st, 2nd(? Let's see this weekend) which is decent. But also that that sort of output may have been achieved without the lever investments considering Auba had a great second half while Lewy only performed for half a season. That Kounde was signed as CB and ended our RB.
CL is a whole different story. Context matters in the group stage quality.
So Quarter is good in isolation, but also expected given the route. Not so good when you win the away leg though and mess up at home. Similar to Europa league after getting a result in Frankfurt.
Anyways point is. If we can achieve a top 1/2 finish in LaLiga, reach CL KO and have a run in Copa while selling Araujo, Frenkie, Gavi/Pedri and Lewy for long term financial health. Then maybe we should.
Because if we keep them all, we will have a same to similar ceiling.
serghei
Senior Member
The first season Laporta took over the team was in a hot mess. If you claim to look at context, then the first season is entirely a cleaning job of getting the players that had huge wages moved on.
That is the season when we played a good part of it with Demir, Jutgla, Ilias, players that were very far from being Barca level. The team was 9th in the league when Xavi took over btw. Even making top 4 was in question at the time.
The La Liga win is excellent indeed, and its importance can't be omitted. That turns the recent seasons into a big success, because it was won against a top 2 side in Europe.
Top clubs are expected to do a lot of things, and yet, few do what's expected of them.
The route you're referring to was obtained by winning the league and being seeded in Pot 1, which is our own doing, and the result of a season's work.
We can't keep the same level of results from the last years if we sell our best players. Makes no sense, sorry. In the last 2 seasons the team won the league and came close to CL semis and potentially a final.
That's difficult to even repeat with the same players... let alone with a depleted squad. The signings from summer of 2022 were an integral part of what allowed us to win the league and go pretty far this season in CL.
To reclaim the league title next season from an improved Madrid... the squad needs improvement not weakening. If we will do that, the the team is effectively waiving any ability to compete vs Madrid for the title next season and well as making it to CL knockouts. I don't think the club wants to do that.
jamrock
Senior Member
We aren't winning la Liga by selling those players and buying lesser players, maybe 1 but not 2-3, what is porque even getting at
This isn't football manager, real Madrid are strengthening while we are getting weaker and we would still complete to win the league? Nerp.
Unless he's saying let's give up on that fight for a few years and when we are ready, we can flip the switch and starting winning again
Doesn't work like that either.
This isn't football manager, real Madrid are strengthening while we are getting weaker and we would still complete to win the league? Nerp.
Unless he's saying let's give up on that fight for a few years and when we are ready, we can flip the switch and starting winning again
Doesn't work like that either.
khaled_a_d
Senior Member
I think what @Porque is trying to say (and correct me if I am wrong), would it change the expected outcome if we took a step back now to sort the financial issues?
Taking a step back in order to move two step forwards.
People need to remember that Liga rules regarding FFP is progressive one, if we don't meet our financial targets we don't get punished like EPL, but we get salary cap shrink even more, with no end to it. People forget that at some point we had a negative 100 million of salary cap. It was why we made the levers.
Liga rules are pretty clear in that, and Liga actually changed it several times to ease thing, but people need to remember that Barca was one of the biggest proponent of this rules.
And sure, that was Bartou, but at the end Bartou was voted as club president fair and square so we should own it.
The 100M question then: Does Barca has a definitive deadline of the current financial issues with FFP?
If the answer is yes, then ok.
Jamrock has a point, don't be seller and keep the team intact till the storm is over.
If the answer is no, then we have to remember that the clock is ticking, well actually the bomb is ticking.
Half of our players who are worth anything has their contracts over in 2026, and all are due a pay raise, if we continue without massive improvement in cap then we are heading into losing those players for free, unless we sell part of the club.
There is simply no way around that,
In such doom day scenario, isn't it better to lose players now and take a step back to sort our issues? Target the 2nd place (not publicly but internally) and build the team with that in mind.
Taking a step back in order to move two step forwards.
People need to remember that Liga rules regarding FFP is progressive one, if we don't meet our financial targets we don't get punished like EPL, but we get salary cap shrink even more, with no end to it. People forget that at some point we had a negative 100 million of salary cap. It was why we made the levers.
Liga rules are pretty clear in that, and Liga actually changed it several times to ease thing, but people need to remember that Barca was one of the biggest proponent of this rules.
And sure, that was Bartou, but at the end Bartou was voted as club president fair and square so we should own it.
The 100M question then: Does Barca has a definitive deadline of the current financial issues with FFP?
If the answer is yes, then ok.
Jamrock has a point, don't be seller and keep the team intact till the storm is over.
If the answer is no, then we have to remember that the clock is ticking, well actually the bomb is ticking.
Half of our players who are worth anything has their contracts over in 2026, and all are due a pay raise, if we continue without massive improvement in cap then we are heading into losing those players for free, unless we sell part of the club.
There is simply no way around that,
In such doom day scenario, isn't it better to lose players now and take a step back to sort our issues? Target the 2nd place (not publicly but internally) and build the team with that in mind.
DonAK
President of FC Barcelona
The issue is that it recently was reported that the club itself have no idea when they'll get past this La Liga FFP conundrum.
Taking a step back might make sense if doing so for a year or two would ensure we'd be back to a 500-700m salary cap limit again as we were previously, but if the people in charge of the club have no clue how long it can take then it might end up making matters worse.
I think Laporta will keep buying time until 2026 when it's rumored he won't stand for re-election and hand over this time ticking bomb to someone else.
Until then they'll try to find creative ways to spend, even if it isn't necessarily the smart thing to do.
Taking a step back might make sense if doing so for a year or two would ensure we'd be back to a 500-700m salary cap limit again as we were previously, but if the people in charge of the club have no clue how long it can take then it might end up making matters worse.
I think Laporta will keep buying time until 2026 when it's rumored he won't stand for re-election and hand over this time ticking bomb to someone else.
Until then they'll try to find creative ways to spend, even if it isn't necessarily the smart thing to do.
jamrock
Senior Member
Taking one step back to take two steps forward,sounds good and works in most scenarios.
But in sports, it doesn't work like that,it's not a switch that can be flipped on and off.
We saw how long it took arsenal and Milan to be competitive again.
But I get the point about players contracts running down in 2026, we need to resign those we think will be our core and sell those who we don't think will help us
But we need to replace them with quality players in the right age group.
But in sports, it doesn't work like that,it's not a switch that can be flipped on and off.
We saw how long it took arsenal and Milan to be competitive again.
But I get the point about players contracts running down in 2026, we need to resign those we think will be our core and sell those who we don't think will help us
But we need to replace them with quality players in the right age group.
jamrock
Senior Member
Laporta isn't barto, man actually cares about the club, he isn't going to hand the club over in a worse situation than he got it in.
Nothin in his time at the club for over a decade suggest that will be the case.
In 2026 we'll be in a new stadium and that will solve 80% of our problems.
Nothin in his time at the club for over a decade suggest that will be the case.
In 2026 we'll be in a new stadium and that will solve 80% of our problems.
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