True, but this era is different. First era since I've been following the club that Barca can't get near a top class signing anymore.
Actually, this is the main reason why I find all of this amusing. People still use past eras from times when we could sign the best players on the planet as some sort of reasonable argument.
Please... those days are long gone. Fans had 2-3 years already to adjust to the new circumstances and are still behaving like clueless kids.
And, still, despite all this, the only club that had a legitimate superior season to us is City last year, running on 1bn spending and Pep as manager.
So excuse me if I find this hilarious.
I don't think the era or spending power makes any difference.
It is about the pressure of the club and how because of this culture how managers are never long term.
I don't think Xavi will be any different, he is already showing signs of wilt physically and verbally gone down the short term season to season contract talk as Pep.
What I will give you is that Xavi has been blessed with press support despite turgid play. And that has given him time short term. Maybe the Catalan press have been paid because the comments sections in Spanish are no different to what people are saying here, in regards to our play.
So it is not really an outlandish claim if people are looking at future managers who can perhaps get more out of the current players all points being the same.
Points being
-Lack of pressure from media
-Complete board support
-Freedom to sign and target who they want
-No pressure to reach CL knockouts.
As for my position on Xavi today for disclaimer persons.
-Still the best option for this season and sacking would be bad decision.
-Perfect hire for amigo clean out and transition
-Still not the finished article and should continue to improve.
-Should stay next season barring complete capitulation
-Gets us playing well for limited runs, mostly coinciding with periods of no injuries
-Poor at scouting transfer targets, but great at assessing player ability when under his command. So give signing responsibilities to the SD
And on that point
-Deco is still questionable. His transfer targets (as per press) that we failed to sign have not been successes so far. So remains to be seen if he is another youth hunting Abidal or got more strategy and acumen to it.