Paul Pogba

El Gato

Villarato!
While I agree with your point about Pogba I don't really see any world class striker available now or next season even for 200m.

Spanish teams are generally going to have to look inward for the foreseeable future if they want to compete. Premier League has so much talent attraction that it doesn't matter where you go, you'll play against the best and get better that way. Hence a guy like Seri would rather go to Fulham than come to any top6 La Liga team. The only feasible market aside from the home one, remains the Latin America, hence all the investments. One has to hope that City dominates that Prem so much that everyone else will get discouraged, but it's so much harder to do...
 

thefa

Banned
in every French star's thread you will find people trying to make the argument that the player had very little to do with the team's success :lol:

"It's not Mbappe, it was these four other players "
" Griezmann didn't do shit, he was carried by the midfield"
" Pogba did nothing, it was all the defense + the attack "

etc...

The reality is that all players bar Giroud had an amazing tournament
 

Sorin

Well-known member
While I agree with your point about Pogba I don't really see any world class striker available now or next season even for 200m. Well, maybe we'll try to convince Griezmann again now that his clause is set at 200m. The Decision part 2 incoming. :rofl1: I think Firmino could be great (though he'll be 28 next year so not exactly a very longterm solution either) but good luck negotiating with Liverpool again after the whole Coutinho saga. :lol: Who else then? I think we'll have to sign someone younger with potential like Werner (if he won't renew or leave RBL before he'll have just a year left on his contract in 2019 so maybe we could get him for a solid price) and hope he'll turn out great. Or hope that Suarez can somehow keep his level at respectable level for another two years while giving first team opportunities to Abel Ruiz this season and then promote him next year. But even if we give him enough playing time and he shows a lot of potential I doubt he'll be ready for a starter role in 2 years.

True. I am too struggling to think of someone, but a forward is a must next season surely. Suarez will not recover his former glory while aging. He will still deliver 20-25 goals in La Liga for the time being, but we need someone besides Messi who scores more than 1 goal in CL. Maybe some hidden gem will surface until we can see what's what with Mbappe after 4 years. :lol:
 

George_Costanza

Active member
True. I am too struggling to think of someone, but a forward is a must next season surely. Suarez will not recover his former glory while aging. He will still deliver 20-25 goals in La Liga for the time being, but we need someone besides Messi who scores more than 1 goal in CL. Maybe some hidden gem will surface until we can see what's what with Mbappe after 4 years. :lol:

He will score a goal in each UCL match guaranteed.

yerry-mina-of-colombia-scores-the-equalizer-with-a-header-in-injury-picture-id991264082
 

Messi983

Senior Member
Spanish teams are generally going to have to look inward for the foreseeable future if they want to compete. Premier League has so much talent attraction that it doesn't matter where you go, you'll play against the best and get better that way. Hence a guy like Seri would rather go to Fulham than come to any top6 La Liga team. The only feasible market aside from the home one, remains the Latin America, hence all the investments. One has to hope that City dominates that Prem so much that everyone else will get discouraged, but it's so much harder to do...

Those players are mostly motivated by money. Why else would they go to WH or Fulham who will probably never get close to CL (or at least EL) level when they can have much better chance getting there in clubs like Valencia, Villarreal or Sevilla? WH or Fulham can probably give better wages than all but the top 3 teams in La Liga.

Luckily Spain is still producing a lot of good homegrown players and clubs should concentrate more on them. But La Liga should also protect those players better especially in smaller teams. Even the best players in Sevilla and Villarreal have release clauses around 30-40M and when richer clubs are starting to knock on their doors it's almost impossible for clubs to keep those players. And clauses of talented youngsters in most mid-lower table La Liga clubs are still around 10M or even lower which every PL club can pay easily. I think they should just get rid off obligatory buy out clauses so clubs would have more chances to keep their best/most talented players or at least get 2-3x more for them than they are getting nowadays if they would decide to sell. But it won't happen so domestic talent will continue to leave La Liga (and in many cases this will prove to be a wrong decision) sooner than they should and clubs will have a hard time to replace them with foreign talents.
 

El Gato

Villarato!
True. I am too struggling to think of someone, but a forward is a must next season surely. Suarez will not recover his former glory while aging. He will still deliver 20-25 goals in La Liga for the time being, but we need someone besides Messi who scores more than 1 goal in CL. Maybe some hidden gem will surface until we can see what's what with Mbappe after 4 years. :lol:

Suarez isn't the issue for at least 2 years provided that one of the 2 things happen: 1) either Valverde actually blows smoke up his ass to make him move, or 2) he decides he wants another CL and isn't discouraged by any failures of the lines behind him, same with Messi.

Defensive and transitional leading minds who understand what Valverde is asking them to do and don't have the ingrained dogma in their heads are the key. Arthur could be of great help to the side if overperforms, completely undeveloped defensively so can be molded on request. A good rotation DM who could actually compete and potentially displace Busquets would also be of value. Umtiti coming off a contract renewal and a very good tournament will be priceless. Serious competitor for Pique is also needed. Fullbacks.. well, you're not necessarily lacking in that department and they're just lacking a bit of discipline, which would come with having an able DM who doesn't cower to senior members of the team.
 

George_Costanza

Active member
Mino Raiola (Paul Pogba's agent) is in discussions with Barcelona for Paul Pogba. However, the excellent World Cup of the french player is currently blocking the negotiations as Manchester United owners want to keep him at all cost [despite Mourinho]. (LeParisien)

It seems Pogba is pushing for Barca's move.
 

Sorin

Well-known member
Suarez isn't the issue for at least 2 years provided that one of the 2 things happen: 1) either Valverde actually blows smoke up his ass to make him move, or 2) he decides he wants another CL and isn't discouraged by any failures of the lines behind him, same with Messi.

Defensive and transitional leading minds who understand what Valverde is asking them to do and don't have the ingrained dogma in their heads are the key. Arthur could be of great help to the side if overperforms, completely undeveloped defensively so can be molded on request. A good rotation DM who could actually compete and potentially displace Busquets would also be of value. Umtiti coming off a contract renewal and a very good tournament will be priceless. Serious competitor for Pique is also needed. Fullbacks.. well, you're not necessarily lacking in that department and they're just lacking a bit of discipline, which would come with having an able DM who doesn't cower to senior members of the team.

You overlook a crucial aspect when you say that Suarez should move/run more. He can't do that, not for an extended season anyway. These issues haven't appeared last season under Valverde. There's 2 seasons now that Suarez is slow and his off the ball movement is poor. Every other run of the mill defender can match him for pace and even exceed it. As far as I see, he doesn't even move that much more for Uruguay, fact that strengthens my point. Considering that his link-up play and first touch is also poor, what does he offer to put us a level above? Please take into consideration that the guy is treated as the second best player of our team with wages to match.

You are talking like Valverde is a proven winner and these shit indoctrinated(with tiki-taka i take it) players are the ones at fault. Yeah, no, he was the one telling the players to defend in Rome and the one who reacted by bringing in fecking Gomes of all players to defend some more at 2-0. Sorry, but that man has another thing coming if he thinks those tactics are suited at Barcelona and should not be followed blindly, unless he realizes that it's not goddamn Bilbao that he manages now. He has to prove it this season to be respected ala Luis Enrique. When the later came in we changed from a heavy midfield play to a more counter attacking style with the focus on our 3 forwards. Seems like the players were not ingrained with some dogma then. He also benched Pique when he underperformed.

Players like Pique playing through an absolute lack of form is on the manager. Valverde is the one acting cowardly by not benching Suarez, Pique, Busquets etc. at various points. Like an expression in my country says, the fish begins to stink from the head.

That being said the players should also take out the heads out of their ass, I agree.
 
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Givenchy

Senior Member
Raiola is poison basically whoring him out to any team that listens for that agents fee cut. Pogba really needs to get rid of him. if he joined Barca/Madrid, i'd give it 2 years before Raiola 'offers' him to PSG, Neymar 2.0
 

Sorin

Well-known member
An agent offers players to teams if the players or their clubs ask them to. I would take MD reports with a giant bucket of salt.

Let's be real here, Pogba had other things on his mind lately and I'm sure United don't even want to hear about Pogba leaving. It's just MD peddling bullshit.
 

El Gato

Villarato!
You overlook a crucial aspect when you say that Suarez should move/run more. He can't do that, not for an extended season anyway. These issues haven't appeared last season under Valverde. There's 2 seasons now that Suarez is slow and his off the ball movement is poor. Every other run of the mill defender can match him for pace and even exceed it. As far as I see, he doesn't even move that much more for Uruguay, fact that strengthens my point. Considering that his link-up play and first touch is also poor, what does he offer to put us a level above? Please take into consideration that the guy is treated as the second best player of our team with wages to match.

He offers all of the above in smaller doses. That doesn't mean he should be replaced. Look at him at Barca vs him for Uruguay. When he knows he has a manager he intensely respects and the teammates he can trust, he has no problem putting a shift in. He couldn't do that at Barca a lot of the time when he knew half of the team doesn't like the formation anyway.

You are talking like Valverde is a proven winner and these shit indoctrinated(with tiki-taka i take it) players are the ones at fault. Yeah, no, he was the one telling the players to defend in Rome and the one who reacted by bringing in fecking Gomes of all players to defend some more at 2-0. Sorry, but that man has another thing coming if he thinks those tactics are suited at Barcelona and should not be followed blindly, unless he realizes that it's not goddamn Bilbao that he manages now. He has to prove it this season to be respected ala Luis Enrique. When the later came in we changed from a heavy midfield play to a more counter attacking style with the focus on our 3 forwards. Seems like the players were not ingrained with some dogma then. He also benched Pique when he underperformed.

Players like Pique playing through an absolute lack of form is on the manager. Valverde is the one acting cowardly by not benching Suarez, Pique, Busquets etc. at various points. Like an expression in my country says, the fish begins to stink from the head.

He isn't proven and they ARE indoctrinated. Every long-serving player is.

Food for thought way of saying this though...

Consider some facts:
1) 5 Barcelona seniors (Pique, Busquets, Alba, Iniesta and Messi; 6 including Masche who was out the door) have never played together in anything other than a variation of a 4-3-3 at Barcelona (sporadically in a 3-4-3 maybe).

2) They have equally never played a season without Alves before 2016 who is an all-time-great #8 playing from RB.

3) Rakitić is the only utility player to have played in a 4-3-3 with Xavi leading it (and someone can correct me if I don't remember this right, but he's rotated in for him more often than not? him or Iniesta).

4) The last backup forward Barcelona seniors treated with minimal trust was.. who..? Pedro?

So this is not only the first season you have had with a different formation, but also with all the utility guys actually having bigger shoes to step into in this new Barcelona. And first season is always a prototype for these things, you're meant to see how it looks and iron out the issues.

Cowardice isn't really the same as trying to have healthy respect to veteran players you assume would be professional and understanding. Change of formation was enough of a shock to their systems. I believe he was soft on them, but he tried to be careful. Being rebellious and coming in with muddy shoes onto shiny Barcelona carpet and changing a philosophy to address an obvious issue with direct benching of senior players who do not conform to the new order is not always the way to go. Not only did he have to choose his incarnation to combat the identity loss, but also kind of fight the board's opinion on it to get players who would ALSO have to fit in between the seniors, who were used to playing with self-sufficient leaders like Alves, Xavi, Masche...

I can kind of understand why he seems to have protected Dembele from the toxicity that comes from fighting through the doctrine. The guy has YEARS of service for the club ahead of him and his inclusion has to go immensely slow. Otherwise those greats will simply turn around and say "aaah, this kid will never get it, it's too difficult". The Suarez and Messi attitude and lack of patience for Semedo at times knowing he's an outsider... Imagine how the personalities in that dressing room have changed over time. 5 years ago you would have had the corner of 4 or 5 tactical geniuses discussing between each other what they ought to do if things aren't going right. Now? It's the Pique-Alba-Suarez corner with outsiders looking in.

I think many of Valverde's decisions are well grounded though on the face of it. Costly in terms of rotations, but this is a VERY difficult dressing room to manage. And I don't think there's a manager out there who could do a better job right now.
 
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Sorin

Well-known member
He offers all of the above in smaller doses. That doesn't mean he should be replaced. Look at him at Barca vs him for Uruguay. When he knows he has a manager he intensely respects and the teammates he can trust, he has no problem putting a shift in. He couldn't do that at Barca a lot of the time when he knew half of the team doesn't like the formation anyway.

We must watch different players then. There was not much of a difference from the shift he put in for Uruguay and the one put in at Barcelona. He probably looked better because Cavani ran his socks off behind him. Here, there's Messi alongside him so his lack of movement is more evident because there's no one covering his ass. You can understand Messi not running his ass off, but there can't be another player doing the same. Sorry, but Suarez is the odd man out.

Small doses? Dude, please, he has messed up simple touches countless of times leading to counter attacks for the other team. He has given poor passes numerous times. Coupled with the fact that his effectiveness in front of goal has diminished, he doesn't warrant keeping him after this season. He just can't justify having the second biggest wage at the club. He won't regain the form of 2 or 3 years ago at 32 years old either. We have to move on to another striker just like your team didn't give in to Ronaldo's requests for a bigger salary at 33 and decided to sell in the end. Ronaldo at least is the second best player in the world, what will be Suarez at 32?


He isn't proven and they ARE indoctrinated. Every long-serving player is.

Food for thought way of saying this though...

Consider some facts:
1) 5 Barcelona seniors (Pique, Busquets, Alba, Iniesta and Messi; 6 including Masche who was out the door) have never played together in anything other than a variation of a 4-3-3 at Barcelona (sporadically in a 3-4-3 maybe).

Is there an issue with the 4-3-3 system? Almost every team worth their salt still plays a variation of 4-3-3. RM, City, PSG, Liverpool etc.

2) They have equally never played a season without Alves before 2016 who is an all-time-great #8 playing from RB.

True.

3) Rakitić is the only utility player to have played in a 4-3-3 with Xavi leading it (and someone can correct me if I don't remember this right, but he's rotated in for him more often than not? him or Iniesta).

There is also Sergi Roberto. Rakitic benched Xavi in 2014-2015 but rarely played together. Xavi was usually subbed in the second half to see the game out.

4) The last backup forward Barcelona seniors treated with minimal trust was.. who..? Pedro?

Who deserved it? Gomes, Vidal, Paco? They don't warrant much trust because they all got plenty of time to gain it and they failed. Placing the blame on the seniors for not trusting them is wrong here. This is on the board and the scouters buying players that don't have the necessary quality and don't fit to boot. Look at the market for these players for example. There's no big club looking to buy them and the clubs that want them, want them for peanuts.

So this is not only the first season you have had with a different formation, but also with all the utility guys actually having bigger shoes to step into in this new Barcelona. And first season is always a prototype for these things, you're meant to see how it looks and iron out the issues.

Cowardice isn't really the same as trying to have healthy respect to veteran players you assume would be professional and understanding. Change of formation was enough of a shock to their systems. I believe he was soft on them, but he tried to be careful. Being rebellious and coming in with muddy shoes onto shiny Barcelona carpet and changing a philosophy to address an obvious issue with direct benching of senior players who do not conform to the new order is not always the way to go. Not only did he have to choose his incarnation to combat the identity loss, but also kind of fight the board's opinion on it to get players who would ALSO have to fit in between the seniors, who were used to playing with self-sufficient leaders like Alves, Xavi, Masche...

I can kind of understand why he seems to have protected Dembele from the toxicity that comes from fighting through the doctrine. The guy has YEARS of service for the club ahead of him and his inclusion has to go immensely slow. Otherwise those greats will simply turn around and say "aaah, this kid will never get it, it's too difficult". The Suarez and Messi attitude and lack of patience for Semedo at times knowing he's an outsider... Imagine how the personalities in that dressing room have changed over time. 5 years ago you would have had the corner of 4 or 5 tactical geniuses discussing between each other what they ought to do if things aren't going right. Now? It's the Pique-Alba-Suarez corner with outsiders looking in.

I think many of Valverde's decisions are well grounded though on the face of it. Costly in terms of rotations, but this is a VERY difficult dressing room to manage. And I don't think there's a manager out there who could do a better job right now.

I won't reply to every point in there because there are some things I agree with and some that I don't and there's no arguing who's right until we see how the next season unfolds.

Bolded sentence, seems like Zidane managed a locker room full of divas quite well from the get go. Barcelona isn't special in this aspect. Valverde's excuses will have to stop if the next season we have the same problems.
 
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