I don’t think you understand the point. By your logic right now if we substitute Busquets we drop from 80 to like 50-60 with Pjanic. The same goes with Braithwaite. These are moves to improve our bench and be in some casual first 11s, take some minutes off Busi, Pedri, FDJ. We don’t have money for upgrades though. We cannot buy that 95 OVR player.
Ok.
He is good as one of 4 players for 3 midfield spots (as a rotation).
But... I still think that we could ask these questions:
1. why did we sold 33 years old Suarez, who knew the club and tactics and was usually scoring a lot?
=> to lose one season and play without a striker
=> only to buy a worse copy of Suarez one year later in Aguero?
2. or, the same:
Why did we got rid of 32 years old Rakitic, who could have been a decent 4th pick in midfield after playing 6 years at a club as the most used midfielder in that period (and had tons of chemistry with a team)?
Or getting rid of 33 years old Vidal, who also played here and had a chemistry?
=> only to change them for Pjanic, who never played in Spain and turned out to be a way inferior player for us than both Rakitic and Vidal?
=> and again, only to buy another similar player, this time in Wijnaldum, who is 31, without any expericence in Spain and in our system?
I would understand if we had 20M offers for Raki/Vidal/Suarez.
But we literally forced them out of a club, for free.
We are even paying a part of Surez's wages who is winning La Ligas for our opponents Atletico, lol.
These sales/new signings don't make any sense. Just a good, old Barca erratic, impulsive nonsense.
An analogy to Suarez/Aguero and Rakitic&Vidal/Pjanic&Wijnaldum would be:
1. to force Messi out of a club this summer
2. then play one season without Messi/a new leader
3. and then splashing 100M wages next summer on a 30 years old/washed up/injured Neymar
Selling Rakitic & Vidal made sense ONLY if we wanted:
1. to play more Pedri/Riki/Illaix and similar young players
2. or we would have bought some 26 years midfielders in their prime
But selling Rakitic & Vidal, who were not perfect, but who were still useful and had a chemistry with a team = and changing them for Pjanic who played 4 years at France and 9 years in Italy (lol) and Wijnaldum, who played 8 years at Holland and 6 years at EPL.
For example, let's try a simple test, out of a last few signings (in midfield and attack), which players clicked right away with our tactics, movement and teammates?
1. Dembele = still don't understand our tactics 4 years later
2. Coutinho = still struggles with fitting in after 3-4 years
3. Paulinho = never really clicked
4. Gomes = he was lost for the whole season with decoy runs
5. Denis = never clicked
6. Arthur = okish, but not good enough
7. Boateng = lost
8. Griezmann = still kinda lost
9. Malcom = meh
10. Turan = never clicked
11. Frenkie = he is still kinda lost in midfield and doesn't fully understands our system and movement
12. Pjanic = hasn't clicked
Basically, the only signings who clicked somewhat faster were Suarez, Rakitic and Vidal.
And we got rid of all of them and forced them out of a club due to being cancers and amigos, only to sign weaker players than them, who had less La Liga experience and who are as equally as physically washed up.
Regarding Wijnaldum, I don't mind him.
I actually like that type of physical/workhorse players.
I am just saying that this whole story over the last 2 summers makes zero sense.
Just a classical Barca's erratic selling/buying without too much long term planning.
** Younger fans who started to follow Barca during 2008-2012 used to though that we are organized club because we were spared from erratic buying in those years since we were blessed with Messi-Xavi-Busi-Iniesta, so there was no need for erratic buying.
But since the Neymar's sale, we have again turned into a classical Barca from 90s and early 00s, who used to buy 8-10 new players each summer, lol.
** a funny story from the past, in seasons 1997/98 and 1998/99, when Van Gaal was our manager in his first stint, he bought 13 players in the first 2 summers, buying 8 Dutch players in 18 Months, lol:
1997 summer: Gk Hesp, RB Reiziger
1997 winter: CB Bogarde
1998 summer: CF Kluivert, CM Cocu, LW Zenden
1998 winter: CB Frank De Boer, CM Ronald De Boer
I have just checked the number of transfers per season in the old times:
1995: 5 new players
1996: 8
1997: 8
1998: 7
1999: 4
2000: 6
2001: 8
2002: 4
2003: 7
2004: 10
2005: 2
2006: 3
2007: 5
2008: 7
2009: 4
2010: 4
2011: 2
2012: 2
2013: 1
2014: 7
2015: 2
2016: 6
2017: 7
2018: 9
2019: 6
2020: 4
Look at how the list was crazy with a lot of signings in 90s and until 2005.
Then we consolidated a team in 2004/05 and 2005/06 with a core of Xavi, Iniesta, Puyol, Valdes, young Messi plus a few foreign gems like Ronnie, Etoo, Marquez.
And then due to Xavi-Iniesta-Messi-Puyol and later Busi, we didn't have to buy too much from 2005 to 2014.
Then when Puyol and Valdes left and when Xavi and Iniesta got older, we needed to buy again, and our signings were always quite horrible with around of 30% of players staying at a club for more than 1-2 years.
This is why I say that Suarez for Aguero and Raki-Vidal for Pjanic-Wijnaldum is a good old Barca's erratic transfer nonsense.
Just buying and selling like madman.
