Exactly! But with the status he has he has himself to blame for supporting mediocre coaches. He could/should have had 1-2 more Ballon D'ors. Now a defender gets it, its a farce.
Would rather have Erik ten Hag. I know that means probably waiting until the summer, but it'll be worth it IMO. Managed Bayern B and Ajax. Both those clubs play the way I think we want Barca to play. But way more importantly than that, he is getting good results.
Get Allegri, he's available, why are we frightened of getting a managet with pedigree, is it because they might not be a yes man for the board?
Barca still have time to turn it around. Leader of La Liga and one win at Camp Nou ensures they finish 1st in the CL group. So it's a good place to start for a new coach. Gallardo, Allegri, Ten Hag are better than lite-Mourinho
Valverdes Barca has looked pale and mediocre for 2 years even when winning, why do you think it will change? It won't!
Valverde will be vindicated soon enough. Rakitic and Roberto were 2 of the scapegoats last season. Replaced by Semedo and De Jong and we play worse than before. You can add Suarez to the list. No goal since he went off in 135 minutes against Levante and Slavia at home. Griezmann 0 goal threat. But hey, he has a smoother touch than Suarez. Same will happen after Valverde gets replaced by whoever. There will be no major improvement. Management ********ed it up with bad signing after bad signing. Coutinho, Dembélé, Griezmann. 400 million thrown away. Coutinho, Démbéle are straight trash, Griezmann plays the same role as Messi and needs a striker infront of him to link up with. Players like Semedo and Lenglet are 7/10 at best, not much more. Semedo's offensive game almost nonexistent. Go outside then blind cross. Would take the linkup of 40 year old Alves back. Arthur is like a crippled Xavi who resembles 30 % of Xavi's game. Keeping the ball very well then ending up getting fouled and on the floor. With poor stamina. Looking chubby with 23. De Jong I don't know what he does. He is not bad, he does not lose the ball but he also does nothing of note. When played as an interior he lacks the final pass, throughballs and control. When played as a DM I don't see the difference to Sergi Roberto there. Solid, good burst in the first few meters. And then? Upfront no pace whatsoever. Messi and Suarez enough to beat most Liga teams and most teams at home but no energy and pace in the crucial and tough games. Once all the seniors retire soon, this would be Barca? Démbéle-Griezmann-Fati Arthur-Puig De Jong Firpo-Lenglet-Todibo-Semedo MAtS Joke. Would be 4th in La Liga at best.
I disagree with pretty much everything you said because I do think that a better coach like Ten Hag can get this team playing like we all know they can. It’s definitely not all on the players imo. There are some who are clearly on the decline and need to phased out. However, I think we have some very talented players who are more than capable of replacing them (bar Messi ofc) given time. No transition of this sort is ever easy. Look at Madrid post Ronaldo. This is a definite changing of the guard. These things take time and often go hand in hand with less then desirable results. A good coach like Ten Hag can make this transition easier. Look at what he has done with Ajax. What would you have us do? Who would you have signed? Who in the current market would actually make this team play better? Please be realistic in your choices.
Agree with alot of that. Although that midfield you listed at the end of your post is better than we've had in a while, which is saying something (because this is also taking on the absurd assumption that we won't sign a single player in the next 5 years)
He didn't say it's all on the players, just being real and pointing out that most of them aren't world beaters. And those that are don't seem to combine well with each other, so have to be realistic about how much a new mgr would improve the results, especially given the lack of good managers available. The squad just doesn't seem to have a great balance to it. Seeing Roberto get so much playing time is frustrating, but the alternatives aren't leaps and bounds better.
De Jong and Arthur are the best thing that happened to us recently *smh*. Remember De Jong getting a standing ovation?
I'm a believer that players make 80 % of a team. Coaches 20 %. There are a few exceptions where the manager might be bigger than the 11 players but in general this is how I would assess it. That's why nobodies (in managerial status terms) like Rijkaard, Tito (RIP), Lucho won CLs, trebles, set 100 point records with Barca. Even Tata was one offside call away from a league title and he was the worst modern Barca manager I've seen who played Neymar on the right wing, used Messi as a poacher who should "not touch the ball too much" (in his own words) and set a crossing record with over 50 crosses in a Copa game against Real Sociedad. If the coach is not totally inept, which Valverde is definitely not (see his work with Espanyol and Athletic Bilbao) then even a better manager will not get MUCH better results because his influence is not that huge. 80 % is on the players. Ten Hag is mentioned. Ten Hag's Ajax is about momentum. They faced 2 declining old teams in Juve and Real (post Ronaldo) and ran them to the ground. Ajax before Ten Hag ran us to the ground as well some years ago. They have a video uploaded on their Youtube channel: Since those CL victories last season momentum is carrying them. Before that they were about to lose the Dutch domestic league. A young team that hasn't won the CL in decades can play with such passion once they smell blood. If Ten Hag comes to Barca with Messi and Suarez upfront and Pique and Lenglet at the back his gameplan goes straight to the trash bin. High press with two 30+ year old slow forwards and two slow centerbacks? With a team where most key players won everything multiple times? Good luck to get the same passion out of this team. Valverde's time is up but if you think Koeman will come in and we will be flying then I have bad news for you.
He actually pretty much said exactly that. Naming almost every player and how mediocre they are. Don’t know how else to look at his post. With that being said, like I’ve mentioned in that same post, this is a squad in transition, and those are rarely easy. Look at Madrid, although it seems they are on the uprise again after a bad period. It’s hardly a surprise the players don’t combine well given this fact. We don’t have a fixed starting eleven. Either through injuries or just Valverde not being able to find the right balance, we’re always going to struggle. The Xavi-Iniesta era was as good as it was because they played together for so long. There was a fixed starting eleven and an actual coach with a plan and proper tactics. Totally incomparable with what we are seeing at the moment. Lastly, how can anyone judge this current crop of young players in this rough patch nonetheless and come to the conclusion that “most of them aren’t world beaters”. Maybe the proper wording is that at the moment they aren’t getting the most out of their potential. Which can very well be “world beaters”. This is definitely also down to the coach. Regarding Ten Hag, I don’t buy the whole “he faced a weak Madrid, Bayern, and Juve” squad. The reality is, he took a bunch of young talented players, mixed with some very average more experienced players (Blind, Schone, Huntelaar) and made them into a well-oiled machine of beautiful football. In doing so, they took it to the much more experienced, expensive and quality sides relative to Ajax. Yes, Madrid especially, wasn’t going through the best of times, and yet they beat Ajax at home before getting beat soundly at home. What of Bayern? Juve? C’mon. Ten Hag turned things around for Ajax. They hadn’t won the domestic title in some time before he came around, let alone be anywhere near close to being a side to be reckoned with in CL, now look at them. Give credit where credit is due.
I agree, but at the same time its more about the future potential with them. Right now they are still a downgrade compared to what we had at those same positions even 3 years ago, never mind compared to the treble-winning season. Same holds true for the other 8 outfield positions. So its understandable that getting good results is proving to be really difficult. Hence, to think firing EV will yield a complete turnaround is wishful thinking (not saying Valverde is w/o blame and part of the problem).
I think our roster overall is good enough to be playing better if we had a better system in place. Are we the most stacked roster in the world? Hell no but we are pretty good. Other than a weak CB (Lenglet) and weak RB (Semedo/Roberto) that have no business starting, the rest of our lineup when healthy is pretty good. We have a good enough roster to contend for the CL. Not to be favorites but to contend and the way we look right now, we are not even contenders. To be fair, neither are our two rivals in Madrid.
Ideally I would love the Ajax manager to take over, but that would not happen till at least the summer. Allegri is available now, appoint him immediately and he still has time to make this a great season. Of course none of this will happen, we will continue with Valverde until we are knocked out of the CL.
We should play a CL lineup of Ter Stegen, Alba, Lenglet, Pique, Semedo, Busquets, De Jong, Arthur, Griezmann, Messi and Suarez. With a good system and more chemistry, this is actually a pretty scary team. Rakitic, Dembele, Fati, Roberto, Alena, Perez are all subs. These guys are inconsistent but they can come on and give us a spark.
what is griezmann position though? i mean,nobody know how to use him. watching him usually come back to defend (must be simone's legacy) then get forward,totally waste his talent. he need to link up with striker,not play as a winger