What should we have done following Guardiola?

[LFCB]

What could we have done to be the most dominant football club from 2012 ? 2022?

We have 16 trophies:
5x La Liga, 5x Copa del Rey, 3x Spanish Super Cup, 1x Champions League, 1x European Super Cup,
1x Club World Cup

Meanwhile Real Madrid have 20:
3x La Liga, 2x Copa del Rey, 4x Spanish Super Cup, 4x Champions League, 3x European Super Cup,
4x Club World Cup

We dominated domestically for a long time - on 3 occasions we achieved the double and 1 treble - but we?re now seeing that fade. We are currently on our longest league title drought since 1999 to 2005.

In Europe we have reached 2 SF?s after 6 in a row between 2007 and 2013.
A final note, we had Messi. 419 goals since the start of 2012 for us which is unmatched (Ronaldo 304), but crucially the right team wasn?t built to help him as he aged.

I?d be interested to see what people think. Did people look past Bartomeu?s Rosell allegiance just because of the treble? Was the wider fan base other than those who could vote worried?

 

[MTL_Barca]

Poor squad management. Coaches, players, everything. Just look up all transfers from 2015 onwards and cry.

Aleix Vidal, Arda, Gomes first bunch of bums. Coutinho, Dembele, Griezmann 3 contenders for worst transfer of all time. Many others came and went, some being better than others, all in all not much lost financially but none of them was able to be established as a long-term starter: Paco, Malcom, Digne, Mina, Arthur, Arturo Vidal, Paulinho, Firpo. Probably more i forgot.

Umtiti crippled.

Pointless stop-gaps in Prince, Murillo, Braithwaite etc

Expensive "book balancing" shenanigans Pjanic and Neto.

I mean again look at the list, it's mind blowing how basically no transfer was truly successful between Raki/Suarez in 2014 and Pedri/Araujo who were bought as young prospects. Even Frenkie is kinda meh so far, just looks better compared to all the other failures.

Coaches similar, but player recruitment is a whole different level of disaster. And that even without considering how much money was spent.

We were able to squeeze the veterans and Messi for pretty long, but at some point you just can't do without successful transfers anymore.

 

[Iniesta Ultra]

Dembele's the only one I thought at the time would turn out well for us. And I still think he can in a different position in the right system. Xavi's too close-minded to try him at RB despite how desperate we are there.

I knew Coutinho and Griezmann wouldn't work out, should've been obvious to anyone with above average intelligence.

As bad as all the transfers have been besides Pedri(future development still ? for me)/Araujo we still had Messi, Suarez, and Iniesta at the beginning to keep us from sinking this low. Even Rakitic was better than FDJ. Now all we have is aging support cast of Busi, Pique, and Alba who are getting way too much of the blame for Xavicross.

Amazing such stupid recruitment choices can be made in any top club, moreso when we're not like United and can't afford to make such mistakes.

 

[Devils]

-Should have signed Modric instead of Fabregas
-Should have signed Bernardo Silva instead of Coutinho
-Should have signed Cancelo instead of Semedo
-Should have signed anyone over Lenglet
-Should have signed anyone over the fullback recruitment, which has been rock bottom terrible.
-Should have signed actual wingers (speed, dribbling, crossing etc) over weirdo hybrid wingers like Griezmann and Torres
-Should have signed actual managers instead bums likes of Tata, Setien and Koeman
-Should have kicked Busi, Alba and Pique to the curb after Ainfield
-Should have kicked Ter-Stegen to the curb after Bayern
-Should never have voted that fossil Joan Laporta back into office
-Should never have bought in Xavi while his pals were still here (any tope manager would have phased those bums out)
-Should have kept Ramon Planes as he was the only one who knew anything about Sporting decisions (recommended both Araujo and Pedri)

 

[Messigician]

-Should have signed Modric instead of Fabregas
-Should have signed Bernardo Silva instead of Coutinho
-Should have signed Cancelo instead of Semedo
-Should have signed anyone over Lenglet
-Should have signed anyone over the fullback recruitment, which has been rock bottom terrible.
-Should have signed actual wingers (speed, dribbling, crossing etc) over weirdo hybrid wingers like Griezmann and Torres
-Should have signed actual managers instead bums likes of Tata, Setien and Koeman
-Should have kicked Busi, Alba and Pique to the curb after Ainfield
-Should have kicked Ter-Stegen to the curb after Bayern
-Should never have voted that fossil Joan Laporta back into office
-Should never have bought in Xavi while his pals were still here (any tope manager would have phased those bums out)
-Should have kept Ramon Planes as he was the only one who knew anything about Sporting decisions (recommended both Araujo and Pedri)

W for rightfully skipping Valverde

 

[LFCB]

We should have taken our chances when they came. Namely, 2018 and 2019 the league was done so early and so we should have turned attentions to CL and not doing a PSG or Juve.
7 years since our last CL, meanwhile Liverpool have been in 3 finals since then, we gave them loads of money for not even the 5th best player in the league, even worse than that we game them their first title in 7 years in the most despicable manner.

Obviously the team we assembled thought it would just happen for them without working. I just still can't get my head around losing such big leads successively. I'm not sure we'll ever see anything like it again and we'll always be the laughed at for that.

 

[Total-Football]

W for rightfully skipping Valverde

We should have signed valverde instead of guardiola 2008

 

[Jadentheman]

Honestly, it didn't really go downhill till 2016. While Barca lost to the likes of Atletico and Real went on a CL spree please keep in mind that La Liga was at it's peak during that period of time. This was when all spanish finals were happening in EL.

1) One of the main problems with the team was a lack of good defense (CB and RB) at the time. Instead, Barto cheaped out on it(instead spent on a ever full attack) and it showed.
2) Neymar's departure. Should have never happened and it was after that point when the team began to slowly collapsing. Messi, was declining but poured his tiring body to hold them up and mask the real problems facing the club. While it was Ney's decision alone, I still believe the club could have prevented the scenario from even happening in the first place. One of that would be had the team not lost so much back then. Which is due back to reason number one.

 

[SeloBarca]

We all saw the decline of the old squad all the way back when Guardiola quit.
Guardiola even said he had a hard time motivating the team at the end.
Yet, when Rosell and Fartomeu took over, instead of rejuvenating the team, the wanted to ride the wave after Laporta, thinking the old players would keep on beeing as good as back then.
When shit hit the fan and they finally realised it wouldnt work, they scrambled to make awful deals with hardly any scouting.

We still havent found quality replacemenets for 90% of the team.
We dont have a top 10 player in any position.

 

[serghei]

We all saw the decline of the old squad all the way back when Guardiola quit.
Guardiola even said he had a hard time motivating the team at the end.
Yet, when Rosell and Fartomeu took over, instead of rejuvenating the team, the wanted to ride the wave after Laporta, thinking the old players would keep on beeing as good as back then.
When shit hit the fan and they finally realised it wouldnt work, they scrambled to make awful deals with hardly any scouting.

We still havent found quality replacemenets for 90% of the team.
We dont have a top 10 player in any position.

Well said.

Rosell and Barto simply wanted a Galactico version of Barca with superstars in attack and not much else. They did bring in two elite players like Neymar and Suarez, but as Suarez got old and Neymar left, they basically had no other plan and just did the same shit only this time they landed wannabe stars.

 

[Windhook]

That is a good thread. Congrats.

Rosell inherited a gold mine from Laporta, under his reign Barca elevated to new heights as a worldwide brand, but yet very few good decision on sporting level. Tito Vilanueva wasn't in condition to manage the team due to the cancer, the team spent months without a real manager. Barca could have achieved more with a healthy Tito, of this I'm certain. Tata Martino was a joke, he got the job like some gesture by the board to Messi. The team wasn't playing good football.

Overall incompatible with Barca's style expensive PR transfers to attract lucrative sponsorships, the Galacticos formula of Real Madrid applied at Barca in the last 10 years, didn't work to its full promise.

 

[malvolio]

That is a good thread. Congrats.

Rosell inherited a gold mine from Laporta, under his reign Barca elevated to new heights as a worldwide brand, but yet very few good decision on sporting level. Tito Vilanueva wasn't in condition to manage the team due to the cancer, the team spent months without a real manager. Barca could have achieved more with a healthy Tito, of this I'm certain. Tata Martino was a joke, he got the job like some gesture by the board to Messi. The team wasn't playing good football.

Overall incompatible with Barca's style expensive PR transfers to attract lucrative sponsorships, the Galacticos formula of Real Madrid applied at Barca in the last 10 years, didn't work to its full promise.

The Tata Martino story was just a lie spread by Rosell in order to denigrate Messi, as he wanted to replace him with Neymar. Can't believe some people still believe that shite. Messi didn't even knew the guy before he was hired.

 

[MTL_Barca]

Looking back pretty much everything since 2014 could very well be seen as an experiment on how much shit you can get away with while still winning titles starting with a great squad + Messi + a lot of money.

And when it finally collapsed due to aging squad and covid Barto dipped

 

[Windhook]

The Tata Martino story was just a lie spread by Rosell in order to denigrate Messi, as he wanted to replace him with Neymar. Can't believe some people still believe that shite. Messi didn't even knew the guy before he was hired.

Who says Messi was directly involved in Tata's appointment? I don't. He's just a part of the motivation behind board's bold decision to appoint a complete unknown in Europe Argentinian coach.

 

[malvolio]

Who says Messi was directly involved in Tata's appointment? I don't. He's just a part of the motivation behind board's bold decision to appoint a complete unknown in Europe Argentinian coach.

They hired an Argentine nobody because it fitted the narative that Messi runs the club and he was the one who asked for Tata.

Rosell wouldn't have brought a bum like that if it was based on sporting decisions.