Luis Enrique

[StarLord]

Lucho may not be an elite coach. However he, Unzue, and their coaching staff, as a unit, are, IMO, the best in the world this season.

What is an "elite coach" in the first place? And by the same token through which you transfer Lucho's success to his coaching staff, the same principle can also be applied to those that many consider as "elite coaches".

In my mind, an "elite coach" is not one that wins titles with uber-expensive teams, but those who consistently overperform with limited resources, if that can be proven by long-term results.

 

[StarLord]

Given the circumstances I don't think Pep would have been able to acheive what Lucho has with the players available. His style doesn't suit the current team . If Pep were here we'd have gotten Kroos/Thiago instead of Rakitic though and that'd probably give him the team he needed to achieve the same results.

We don't know what Pep would have done with our current arsenal, but Lucho has definitely done well. He fully realized that with the decline of Xaviniesta, the tiki-taka system became obsolete. While we remain very much a possession team (which is good) Lucho emphasized pressing and solid defending, something that allowed us to destroy teams on the counter. Lucho even managed to correct our bane of the last few years, namely set-pieces. On that alone he deserves tons of credit. The rest is down to our players playing awesome and awesomer.

 

[Alik]

I hope you're not serious. Lucho has done well and he deserves the credit, but let's not pretend that he has magic skills and knowledge that no other manager in the world does. He's a beginner coach. And that doesn't mean he can't work well and be successful.

And I like to think that these absolutely incredible players also have something to do with it.

Technically that's not what he said though. He didn't say that Lucho is the best manager.

He said that nobody could have done better that Lucho for Barca this season. And if we win the treble, one can easily agree with that, as there is not much left to better that. Most goals scored, least goals conceded, win against nearly all big opponents too.

 

[Bran the Greenseer]

We don't know what Pep would have done with our current arsenal, but Lucho has definitely done well. He fully realized that with the decline of Xaviniesta, the tiki-taka system became obsolete. While we remain very much a possession team (which is good) Lucho emphasized pressing and solid defending, something that allowed us to destroy teams on the counter. Lucho even managed to correct our bane of the last few years, namely set-pieces. On that alone he deserves tons of credit. The rest is down to our players playing awesome and awesomer.

True can't know for sure what Pep would have done with these players but looking at his Bayern team I would be persuaded to say he'd still try to play his style, not that theres anything inherently wrong with that.

Also on a broader note, We were blaming lucho after the La Real loss, we blamed him after the Classico loss we blamed him for everything so it's only right that he gets all the praise now that we've turned it around. We had the same team in the first half of the season as we do now, only thing that changed was tactics players coming into form. Its not like we secretly brought in Pep or Mourinho to do shadow coaching or anything.

 

[Barcaman]

We're on verge of a domestic double winning against European and Spanish champions. Eliminated French, English and close to finishing off German champions.
Along that way broke many records already.

There's always a possibility of everything. Soneone doing a better job than Lucho? Sure. Barca could possibly lose 10-0. That kind of talk gets you nowhere.

Lucho ushered us to life after Xaviesta and brought all this excitement back when few believed in him.

 

[Stric]

Technically that's not what he said though. He didn't say that Lucho is the best manager.

He said that nobody could have done better that Lucho for Barca this season. And if we win the treble, one can easily agree with that, as there is not much left to better that. Most goals scored, least goals conceded, win against nearly all big opponents too.

Yes, I could have misintepreted that, and if that's the case, I apologize. However, we still haven't won any trophies. We will likely win at least two, I hope. And even if we do win all three, there's no way of knowing if someone could have done it also, or if Lucho is the only person who could have done it. What I can't support, however, is the claim that Lucho is the only one with the competence/talent/vision/ideas to make it happen. He's done extremely well, but there's nothing that suggests other coaches wouldn't have been able to do the same. Simply because they haven't tried.

I do take my hat off to Lucho, though. I was very critical of him earlier in the season, and not in my wildest dreams could I even imagine the current scenario. His decisions and most importantly, his attitude indicated we were going to fail big time. For a while there, it looked like we were heading downhill with even greater speed than in the past two seasons. Well done, Lucho and everyone else who made it happen.

 

[mssarm]

One thing I like about current team: We finally have a plan B and probably C. We can give the ball to the opponent, sit deep and pass long balls to counter. That's how we destroyed Atleti .I can't forget the frozen face of Cholo Simeone who was looking in disbelief how Barca was scoring from the counters and he had no idea how to deal with it. Pep's and Tito's Barca was crystallized in Tiki Taka which was great at the time but started fade away. Tata understood the need for new ideas but was unsuccessful with implementation. It seems like Lucho who understands Barca basics, was able to integrate all new trends of contemporary football.Now Barca is the frontrunner again with newly developed play-style and Lucho will be the best coach for Barca for next 3-4 years. It would be very interesting to see how this team will further develop under Lucho, however I don't believe Luicho will stay for another year. I just want to thank him for the exciting games we had with him, regardless the silverware we win this year. Still can't figure out our formation on that PSG game

 

[barcanuck]

We're on verge of a domestic double winning against European and Spanish champions. Eliminated French, English and close to finishing off German champions.
Along that way broke many records already.

There's always a possibility of everything. Soneone doing a better job than Lucho? Sure. Barca could possibly lose 10-0. That kind of talk gets you nowhere.

Lucho ushered us to life after Xaviesta and brought all this excitement back when few believed in him.

Hopefully we top it off with a win against the Italian champions! We'll truly be the champions of champions!

 

[Ini8]

One thing I like about current team: We finally have a plan B and probably C. We can give the ball to the opponent, sit deep and pass long balls to counter. That's how we destroyed Atleti .I can't forget the frozen face of Cholo Simeone who was looking in disbelief how Barca was scoring from the counters and he had no idea how to deal with it. Pep's and Tito's Barca was crystallized in Tiki Taka which was great at the time but started fade away. Tata understood the need for new ideas but was unsuccessful with implementation. It seems like Lucho who understands Barca basics, was able to integrate all new trends of contemporary football.Now Barca is the frontrunner again with newly developed play-style and Lucho will be the best coach for Barca for next 3-4 years. It would be very interesting to see how this team will further develop under Lucho, however I don't believe Luicho will stay for another year. I just want to thank him for the exciting games we had with him, regardless the silverware we win this year. Still can't figure out our formation on that PSG game

Why don't you think he will get another year?

 

[mssarm]

elections-to send a message that Barca is starting from new page(elections are political games, both Barto or Laporta or any other candidate might go for it).
sour relationship with Messi- we don't know for sure what is the current status between both of them, but there's no denial that there's still a tension. Add to that Neymar's body language when he got substituted. Looks like Neymar is having bumpy relationship with Lucho as well. I'm not saying Lucho lost the dressing room , but the tension with 2 of his star players is not a good thing, especially with Messi. Finally, Lucho's refusal to talk about his continuity , his unwillingness to to negotiate his contract renewal or his refusal to get involved with Braida and scouting team regarding new signings is something unusual. I hope I'm wrong but the other day one of the journalists was asking about his future plans a as a Barca coach and Lucho was avoiding to give any hint that he might consider extended terms with Barca.

 

[Richard.H]

Lucho has a much more strict personality type than Pep. I'm sure the players realize this.

The new board needs to realize this if they get elected. I feel like Lucho is the type of coach that will immediately leave if he's unhappy about something. Just keep things smooth for him and it should be okay.

 

[raskolnikov]

We definitely need some stability with the board/trainer.

 

[cris29]

If anything we need to keep the backroom staff, especially fitness trainers. I'd like it if he stayed as i don't see many top coaches available, plus don't want us to turn into Madrid.

However, i've been wrong so many times this season that i barely have an opinion anymore!

 

[Ini8]

elections-to send a message that Barca is starting from new page(elections are political games, both Barto or Laporta or any other candidate might go for it).
sour relationship with Messi- we don't know for sure what is the current status between both of them, but there's no denial that there's still a tension. Add to that Neymar's body language when he got substituted. Looks like Neymar is having bumpy relationship with Lucho as well. I'm not saying Lucho lost the dressing room , but the tension with 2 of his star players is not a good thing, especially with Messi. Finally, Lucho's refusal to talk about his continuity , his unwillingness to to negotiate his contract renewal or his refusal to get involved with Braida and scouting team regarding new signings is something unusual. I hope I'm wrong but the other day one of the journalists was asking about his future plans a as a Barca coach and Lucho was avoiding to give any hint that he might consider extended terms with Barca.

If he ends up winning the Treble, no presidential candidate will get backing from the socios if he wants to bring a new coach in.

Also, I don't think Lucho's relationship to the star players is that bad. It's just strictly professional between them IMO.

 

[Barcaman]

Big bad Rosell kept pep so how good old Laporta wouldn't keep lucho?