like during Luis Enrique's last season?
Sure Lucho's last season wasn't good and there are legit criticisms to be made of him. Yet at least the man tried to change things during his time here.
He changed the Midfield with the addition of Rakitic and had the balls to make Xavi a bench player in his final season. He turned Roberto, who was on the verge of leaving the club to join Stoke City, into a very reliable squad player. He benched Mascherano, a guy that was possibly his most favorite player and most trusted player in the squad for Umtiti. Hell, he tried even making Gomes a starter over the likes of Rakitic but sadly he was clearly not good enough but I give Lucho credit for trying to revamp the Midfield again then.
The two seasons Valverde has been here I haven't really seen much in terms of actual development and changing things up that actually meant something. Lenglet? the only reason he became a starter this season was because Umtiti suffered injuries and Verm also suffered his worse season in years in terms of injury problems as well.
Arthur? took a couple of months for Valverde to actually trust him and give him a start vs Tottenham and despite his performances, he got benched during the most crucial time in the CL semis for that Zombie Midfield of Vidal-Busi-Rakitic. Despite being our only CM that can resist the press.
Dembele/Coutinho? Valverde clearly didn't have it in him to actually develop/Utilize either of the players properly and forced a musical chairs situation between the two. Dembele went on a hot streak and showed his real potential until an ankle injury derailed it and came back was a bit rusty and ended up suffering some muscle discomfort, only for Valverde to still play him vs Lyon as a sub because he was panicking on the sidelines only for Dembele's injury to get worse. But hey we got passed Lyon so that's okay!
Malcom? Lol, dude was basically the red-headed stepchild of this team. Instead of actually making him a useful option he was dicked around all season and treated like garbage that came off as personal vendetta because he wasn't Willian. Played his best match for us vs Real in the Copa, only to be never seen on the pitch until a month later.
Alena? Yeah, he got promoted but hardly seen much consistent action and even when the team was 5-0 up the guy still was on the bench. Only started to play more towards the second half of the season once things were starting to be wrapped up in the league.
Semedo? I consider one of Valverde's most mismanaged players we brought in. The guy never seemed to have gotten a real run of games and when he actually did well he was eventually benched yet again for Roberto. Semedo's strengths are clearly his defensive qualities yet it seemed Valverde hasn't done shit to actually help him improve his offensive game. The same damn story with every other players we brought in during his reign.
Vidal? the only reason he started to feature more because his performances were too good for him to be ignored like Arthur. But sadly Vidal and Arthur were forced to fight for one spot no matter how good both were despite the poor performances of Rakitic and Busi.
Valverde just rode off what Lucho did and half-assed the development of players that were brought in under him. When things got tough he went back to his precious 4-4-2 because he didn't know a damn thing on how to create a proper system and cohesive team that can create an environment to help get the most out of a number of players in this squad and to help properly develop players.
That's why I scoff at the idea that the players we brought in are overrated or crap in general. We just have a coach who is flat out not good enough for this level. It's easy to coach limited players at Bilbao but here we can afford to buy some of the best talents out there, he doesn't have a damn clue how to develop them.
Real easy just playing them but without the coaching and guidance, they aren't going anywhere. It's actually frightening what guys like Pep, Klopp, Poch, etc could do with this team.