Ernesto Valverde

[FCBarca]

Such as?

Someone with courage more than anything but no question one who can get his players to play exciting football with the philosophy that set this club apart. Valverde may have played for Cruyff but his teams never played in that manner

A club of this stature, with this sort of history & tradition with even a semblance of sporting knowledge would've fired him after Rome - it's a disgrace. We're not your club, winning without entertaining (Much less earning it) is of no interest to me. I watch football for the joy it evokes and the last 2+ years have been only about Leo/Mats - not a team and certainly nothing memorable much less entertaining

Setién is currently without a job, I'd give it to him today - in a heartbeat

 

[El Gato]

Setién is currently without a job, I'd give it to him today - in a heartbeat

Fair enough.

 

[EdmondDantes]

Someone with courage more than anything but no question one who can get his players to play exciting football with the philosophy that set this club apart. Valverde may have played for Cruyff but his teams never played in that manner

A club of this stature, with this sort of history & tradition with even a semblance of sporting knowledge would've fired him after Rome - it's a disgrace. We're not your club, winning without entertaining (Much less earning it) is of no interest to me. I watch football for the joy it evokes and the last 2+ years have been only about Leo/Mats - not a team and certainly nothing memorable much less entertaining

Setién is currently without a job, I'd give it to him today - in a heartbeat

I have a feeling Valverde will see out the season and we'll get Setien - in the summer - on a short term deal with start with.


I think he's more than willing to wait until then as well.

 

[Messigician]

Barça assume this will be Valverde's last season at the club and all roads lead to Ronald Koeman as his successor. [as.com]

 

[FCBarca]

I have a feeling Valverde will see out the season and we'll get Setien - in the summer - on a short term deal with start with.


I think he's more than willing to wait until then as well.

I doubt very much this board would consider him knowing his past history of not accepting to be a board stooge like Valverde. I would love him but I don't see it happening, especially when Quique effectively issued a come get me plea this summer when there were rumours of Valverde's impending sack

Koeman ticks all the boxes a board with no sporting sense would consider despite liking and preferring him to Valverde - we simply need better. Xavi is not quite there yet and Ten Hag hasn't coached/played in the Primera which now appears to be a fundamental criteria for any prospective Barcelona coach. Gallardo is an interesting option but everyone at the club would fear a Tata revival

 

[George_Costanza]

I doubt very much this board would consider him knowing his past history of not accepting to be a board stooge like Valverde. I would love him but I don't see it happening, especially when Quique effectively issued a come get me plea this summer when there were rumours of Valverde's impending sack

Koeman ticks all the boxes a board with no sporting sense would consider despite liking and preferring him to Valverde - we simply need better. Xavi is not quite there yet and Ten Hag hasn't coached/played in the Primera which now appears to be a fundamental criteria for any prospective Barcelona coach. Gallardo is an interesting option but everyone at the club would fear a Tata revival

While I like Setien's style of play but I really doubt he can manage the dressing room well. Barcelona needs a strong manager and inspirational leadership the most. I think Gallardo should be the number one target above Koeman, Setien and ten Hag. Gallardo lost all of his starting XI after winning his first Copa Libratodas and still managed to build another strong team, won another continental trophy due to his leadership and tactical brain. Guardiola can't stop praising him too.

 

[Messigician]

Barcelona, for example, returned from their mid-week 2-1 win over Slavia Prague with goalkeeper Marc Andre Ter Stegen giving an illuminating interview about the state of the dressing room.

“I think we need to talk about some things,” he said.

“I think that’s something we have to look at ourselves.

“I won’t say it here, because it’s more internal.

“It’s not my thing, I’d like to speak to the players who were on the pitch first.

Balague assessed: “If you hear Ter Stegen at the end of the game against Slavia Prague, it sounded like there are problems in the squad – it is down to the fact he felt, and others are feeling the same, players are not working hard enough, and it is very easy to attack Barcelona these days.

“When you look at the results of Barcelona at home, with eight leagues in 11 years, you say nothing is wrong. But the train, the fast train of European football has caught both teams. They cannot maintain the high level of intensity of Liverpool, Borussia Dortmund sometimes, especially the English sides too; they can try to battle for the league but that is not enough.

“When they come into Europe it is not enough and they get found out. It is not a matter of one or two missing, it is as if they are a little obsolete in the way they propose their football. They need to be more intense, faster, get the ball quicker. Right now, Barcelona, they are not doing that.”

 

[FinBarcelonafan]

Barcelona, for example, returned from their mid-week 2-1 win over Slavia Prague with goalkeeper Marc Andre Ter Stegen giving an illuminating interview about the state of the dressing room.

“I think we need to talk about some things,” he said.

“I think that’s something we have to look at ourselves.

“I won’t say it here, because it’s more internal.

“It’s not my thing, I’d like to speak to the players who were on the pitch first.

Balague assessed: “If you hear Ter Stegen at the end of the game against Slavia Prague, it sounded like there are problems in the squad – it is down to the fact he felt, and others are feeling the same, players are not working hard enough, and it is very easy to attack Barcelona these days.

“When you look at the results of Barcelona at home, with eight leagues in 11 years, you say nothing is wrong. But the train, the fast train of European football has caught both teams. They cannot maintain the high level of intensity of Liverpool, Borussia Dortmund sometimes, especially the English sides too; they can try to battle for the league but that is not enough.

“When they come into Europe it is not enough and they get found out. It is not a matter of one or two missing, it is as if they are a little obsolete in the way they propose their football. They need to be more intense, faster, get the ball quicker. Right now, Barcelona, they are not doing that.”

Balague is a smart guy.

 

[Rory]

There's not a team in the world (except Real Madrid lol) who turn up to a game against Barcelona and think they won't get many chances. They turn up with such confidence that the game is winnable and it's because of the tactics EV has with playing forward as well as his defensive approach.

The players don't seem to care either and you can tell they are mentally weak. Whenever the score is 0-0 or only 1-0 you can see the whole team shitting themselves that the other team might score and they might lose. They honestly all need to go and see some psychologists or something. When it's 2-0, 3-0 they play like a different team in my opinion. And sure you could say that about most teams, they're only truly comfortable in a game they are winning by 2 or more but it's not just that, it's the feeling that once they start losing that's it, game over, no coming back and you can see it in them.

Opponents turn up and have so many chances and it's because of the setup and individuals not being good enough or not having enough options.

They know Busquets is easily pressed, that Vidal isn't great on the ball. That Arthur is very good on the ball but teammates don't move very much for him and same for Frenkie. They know Messi and Suarez won't run much. They know Pique can be a soft touch and lack concentration in big moments, Lenglet is beatable and not physical enough. Alba just about passes as a left back only because he is positioned there on the team sheet, Roberto isn't a defender and Semedo is one dimensional.

There's not an area on the pitch where an opposition player doesn't have the mindset "I can win this personal battle". Look at every other top european team and it just isn't the same. Teams go to liverpool and know they will be pressed to the final whistle, they go to man city and know they will hardly get the ball and will be pressed. They go to Juventus and know they will run further than them and most likely lose the physical battles. Even Atletico Madrid you know that you'll have to grind out a result and maybe get one or two chances if you play your cards right.

Comments like that from MATS say a lot, it confirms the weak mentality shown in Rome and Liverpool has gotten so poisonous it affects players every game and not just their mentality but physically too. They don't bother, they barely track their men, they don't make runs forward or even two steps left/right to lose their man. It's painful having to watch such tactics play out when the quality is there for so much more.

You could argue 2 league titles and a copa is a decent return for any team in two years and even by Barcelona's own standards throughout history, of course they weren't always so dominant. But the facts are we have been in a generation of dominance, we have the GOAT and plenty of quality around him and a lot of money to spend on any player we want. So yes I demand more from this team and this manager. It's not good enough to lose 0-3 to Roma in a one off game, it's especially not good enough to then lose to Liverpool 0-4 in similar circumstances, that's when you know it's a systemic issue and not just an unlucky one off game.

 

[Potroh]

The players don't seem to care either and you can tell they are mentally weak.
Comments like that from MATS say a lot, it confirms the weak mentality shown in Rome and Liverpool has gotten so poisonous it affects players every game and not just their mentality but physically too.

Some players can be in a mentally indisposed state but it rarely or never happens collectively.
Lack of motivation is usually the culprit in these cases, but it's a matter that is largely on the coach's shoulder, as he is the one to actually motivate his team. Not one by one but collectively.

I've seen MATS comments, but frankly I wasn't truly persuaded by that. I think it was yet another attempt to take off the responsibilities from the coach's shoulder.
(It's a very simple mechanism, if you spread the responsibilities nobody will be taken as individually responsible. But the coach is responsible alone for everything, individually, thus by disseminating the weight, they wish to save the coach).

Psychologically speaking, an entire team can not be in the same state at a given moment, there will always be differences, specially that what we usually mean by psychology nowadays, is covering individual states, actions and reactions.

Along with the subs, 13-14 players can not be psychologically in a similar state, although they can be frightened, unmotivated, tired and things like that, still their mental state will hugely differ.

If the team went to the pitch at those important moments, by thinking it will not be difficult, they would score one goal somehow and the opposition will not score three times, it can be an underestimation of the situation, it can be lack of motivation but it has nothing to do with the psychological state of an entire team.

When tactics are missing or don't work out, players tend to behave like Suarez does, with the difference they rather swallow their inner imbalance and reactions.
When players come off the pitch feeling that they individually did well, only the others screwed up their chances or made huge mistakes, that is the moment when they start saying things like MATS did. They talk about collective responsibilities but make no mistake about it, they don't think it seriously for a second. Just the opposite of that: they are positive about they individually did their best and the mistakes of the others led to the unwanted result.

 

[FCBfan22]

I think there is some serious entitlement in our squad amongst the seniors. Im looking at you Suarez, Alba, Pique and Messi. Ernesto doesn't have the balls to coach seniors. That results in 0 workrate by Suarez and Leo (while ignoring other players in attacks), Alba doing whathever the fuck he wants on the left flank and Pique focused on football when he desires so.

So even if Valverde had/has any useful tactics, they would only apply to 6-7 outfield players (because of Valverde's lack of balls), which is shown especially in our defensive phase. We are defending with 8 outfield players (4-4-0), Suarez and Leo camping offside, while the 3rd attacker needs to do their work, Alba getting caught high upfield and the defense, whose leader should be Pique as he is the senior there, is shambles.

So basically, we need someone who is good tactically and has a big fat pair of bollocks on him to tell the entitled players that they are here to work and win, not doing fuck all and expecting to win.

 

[Potroh]

Ernesto doesn't have the balls to coach seniors.

No. EV doesn't have the KNOWLEDGE to coach those seniors, which is a huge difference. The coach could be as aggressive as he is capable to, the players wouldn't listen to him, unless he says something meaningful, and I doubt he says meaningful things.

Most probably the seniors have a better tactical knowledge on many aspects of the game, compared to EV, therefore they simply ignore him.
If they ignore him, I can't put it on the players, because the coach needs to have the personality, charisma to achieve the thorough attention of the players.
If they don't take him as a father-figure, it means the coach is not fit to coach this particular team.

 

[Rory]

Not trying to be rude here but I think your points are quite pedantic and picking on semantics. Also you've used a false premise to base your arguments on which isn't really fair in a discussion.

Of course every player won't have the literal same mindset/psychology because every human is unique even identical twins have huge differences.

And sure maybe not 13-14 players all have the exact same mental state, maybe they aren't all thinking "oh no we're about to lose again." But if even a few players do not have that mindset then it makes it very very difficult for the team as a whole to play collectively and at the level they need. That mindset can be seen in body language by other players and maybe the 2 that had the bad mindset at the first minute of the game has crept up to 5-7 players by the 60th minute. I don't know if this is true, maybe I'm totally wrong it's just the way I see it.

And don't get me wrong I place the fault with Valverde, he doesn't give us a fighting chance in some games and his tactics result in this bad mentality from the start to finish. He also lacks any motivational skills required to lift the team up.

Also your last point with MATS doesn't make much sense to me. I think he would say those things for the reason you give only if the team lost. But they won and he played extremely well. There's no need for him to acknowledge the poor performance of the team unless of course he is genuinely unhappy with the team and knows there are issues that need to be addressed.

 

[Potroh]

Also your last point with MATS doesn't make much sense to me. I think he would say those things for the reason you give only if the team lost. But they won and he played extremely well. There's no need for him to acknowledge the poor performance of the team unless of course he is genuinely unhappy with the team and knows there are issues that need to be addressed.

As a matter of fact, there is no need to even acknowledge a poor performance, because a few million people saw the game and it's very unlikely that all of them are delusional.
He just said it was a bad performance (like the other mentioned ones were) nothing interesting about that, it would be strange and interesting if he said otherwise.

We know there are problems and the players know it - probably better than we do.
The interesting part comes when an individual player also tries to name the cause or causes of bad performances or fiascos, because he simply has two choices:
Either he very sophisticatedely puts the weight on the coach, circumstances, fatigue or other factors, or he just says what he actually said.

When a player stands out and talks about collective responsibilities, it is the very same thing as saying nothing, because he knows the fans and spectators know they did badly, they know that they know and the obviously the fans also know that the players know it, so it equals to saying nothing.

It's just a century long contrivance to disseminate responsibilities collectively, in order to save individuals.

 

[Aryagorn]

I personally think ter Stegen's statement is more to put the stupid manager in bad light than calling out on the players for a bad performance - especially considering the fact that the said players are great players themselves and have a bigger stature at the club and in general than the keeper himself!