Mails: Are we witnessing the fall of a Barcelona empire?

Sarah Winterburn

You know what to do – mail us at theeditor@football365.com

 

Blessing in disguise for Barca?
This may just be the best result for Barca because maybe now they will realise they have huge problems. Forget buying Coutinho and Dembele, they also need two central defenders to slowly phase out Pique and Mascherano who are clearly on the slide. To be honest it felt like men against boys for large swathes of that game. Recruits need to be acquired as well as brought in from la Masia. In their current guise they are unlikely to get past the second round in the Champions League.

I’d even go as far as saying Arsenal picked the wrong season to miss out on the Champions League they’d take this bunch easy. How did they become this sh*t in two seasons?
Timi, MUFC

 

It’s the fall of an empire…
Let’s take a minute to remember the greatest and most entertaining football side the world has ever seen. It feels like the end of an empire. A footballing side so dominant and so good, that only time was ever going to stop it. While time is yet to trully catch up with the number 1 talent in the team, it has managed to reel in enough of the supporting cast to cause what seems to me to be permanent damage.

Time initially started by taking away the master controller Xavi, and has continued on in its destructive path by recently robbing us of the mesmerizing Neymar. Who was easily lured away for over €200 million, which was a figure that would have been rebuked across the world only three years ago but was forgotten almost two days after the shocking transfer. Time has robbed us of the speed of thought and execution of Luis Suarez. He looked quite laboured yesterday, reminded me of an aging Henrik Larson, the body just couldn’t keep up with the brain. Time has robbed us of the genius of Andreas Iniesta, we’ll add injury as well because that man was special on the field but spent a couple of weeks of it each season. But crucially, time seemed to have robbed us of Messi’s interest in the game. He really was on and off, and was nowhere to be seen in the counter attacks.

As Fergie once said, football goes in cycles, and Messi is still around, but it feels like Barca have fundamentally screwed up in terms of transfers, continuous building, and by letting go of Neymar. With the Neymar money, they should ideally be able to build a powerful core but now everyone knows they have it so everyone is willing to see how much of the cash pile they can get. It’s not going to be easy. Add to this the new manager who looks absolutely uninspiring, the lack of competitive wages on offer due to Messi’s pay deal, and the youth pipeline of la masia drying up. It’s not looking good folks. Add to the fact, I do not see anyone they can get to significantly improve them, it maybe a very long season even if they get Coutinho and Dembele.
Dave (Maybe they can loan back Neymar for one last season), Somewhere

 

…Listening to the post-match analysis of the Madrid-Barca game. It may be early to call but is this the end of Barca? Continual poor recruitment over the last few years and reliance on the same few players has directly lead to this. A club that once had players dream to play for them, now has a coach who I doubt would be a first preference for any Champions League club. There is a reason behind Neymar leaving and I think it goes a lot deeper than getting out of Messi’s shadow.

They receive $200 whatever plus for Neymar, and who is brought in? An ex player who was being loaned out by the mid-table club that bought him because he isn’t good enough for them. Imagine being told you aren’t good enough for Everton and then being called and told you are playing for Barcelona.

Down 3-1 and they come and start with a 3-5-2 which they have never played nor needed to play. They were pants in the first half and rightfully down 2-0. The second half they went back to a normal 433 and at least looked threatening. But none of them looked like they cared anyway. Pique was horrible, Messi looked agitated and Suarez looked angry enough to bi…. anyway.

The scary thing is Madrid I feel can only get better. All the kids that come to Spain are being snapped up by Madrid, they consistently sell/Loan players who aren’t up to scratch no matter what their name is and have quite a lot of quality depth, unlike Barcelona.

I personally hope this is the end of their supremacy in general, they deserve it after 06′ haha, but be weary of the wounded beast.
Steve

 

Masch still perfect for Liverpool though…
Good question Sean Peter-Budge. Javier Mascherano is who I’d want back at my club. Why? Because I think he is exactly what we need to cover our shambolic defence and provide some much needed leadership in defensive areas. Even if it’s only for a season or two given that he turned 33 this summer.
Mukund Kannan (LFC) Manila, Philippines

 

More returning heroes…
Sean Peter-Budge asks the question “who would you want back at your club?”

As a Spurs fan it’s Benoît Assou-Ekotto. He may be 33 now and living it up at Metz, but he was a super player who we let go far too early. Plus he didn’t have his head up his arse like so many footballers – he played in £23 boots, drove a Smart car and freely admitted that football was just a job to him.

Watching him showboat in our area to get himself out of trouble every week left Spurs fans with their hearts in their mouths.

Defensive liability? Absolutely. Entertaining? Abso-bloody-lutely.
Ian

 

…Sean Peter-Budge asked who we’d like to sign back. Apparently Bale is not an option for us Spurs fans, sadly true of course, so I’d opt for Sigurdsson. Everton can keep Ross Barkley, Gylfi just has that extra class and I thought it was the wrong decision to let him go to Swansea in the first place.

It does beg the question, if you have a sell-on clause for 10%, does that still apply if you re-sign the player yourself (it becomes a discount?)
Thom, Bristol-based Spur

 

…This kind of pointless football theorising kicked off by Mr Peter-Budge is exactly why I love reading the mailbox, so I thought I’d properly engage in the debate for once. I’ve reviewed the former players of the top seven teams from last season’s Prem table and given an active player who used to play for each one who could reasonably be signed for the previous club in question. I understand that fans of these sides will probably know more than myself, and that this mail will probably invite plenty of criticism – but isn’t that the point of the mailbox anyway?

Chelsea:
Quite a few to mull over here. In my mind, the sales of Matic, Ake and in particular Chalobah were mistakes, but the club would obviously have to wait till at least January before even considering a repurchase. Signing De Bruyne is surely out of the question. It would be a stretch but by no means beyond the realms of possibility that Robben could return – Chelsea are short of players in all positions (unlike Bayern). With a large bid, Bayern may be willing to allow Robben to play out his final couple of years in England. That all seems a little too unlikely, so I’ll go for Ryan Bertrand, who has matured into a rather good player at Southampton, can easily play as a wing-back to offer at least competition for Alonso and bulk up the thin squad. He’d probably go for silly money, but what player isn’t this summer?

Spurs:
Before Bournemouth snapped him up, I would have thought a few Spurs fans would have pretty happy with getting Defoe on a free, who would solve the issue of inadequate cover for Harry Kane. Resigning Modric is impossible (for this summer at least), so the list of possible candidates seems to be reduced to a handful of potential squad players. They could sign any one of Chris Gunter from Reading, Kyle Naughton from Swansea or Adam Smith from Bournemouth to add some experienced cover for Trippier, or even Livermore to provide a bit of cover for Wanyama and Dembele. Pretty uninspiring really…with a gun to my head I’d go for Smith.

Man City:
Jerome Boateng? If there’s one club that splashes the cash on defenders it’s City, and Pep has said that he wants another centre-back. But it would have to be a shedload to convince Bayern and Boateng to agree to any kind of deal. Two cheaper options would be Savic (a much improved defender and regular for Athletico) or even Ben Mee, who was very impressive last season. You would think that Burnley would never sell Mee as well as Keane in one summer, but if City threw £20 million on the table, Dyche would do well to keep hold of him. If Ederson had not signed for crazy money, my answer would undoubtedly have been Schmeichel.

Liverpool:
I did think that the sale of Allen was a puzzling one, particularly after his brilliant Euro campaign, but I’m not sure resigning him would necessary be a step in the right direction for Klopp. Mignolet proved yet again on the weekend that he costs his side too many points, so resigning Reina would be welcomed for the mere purpose of getting their current keepers out of the picture. However, if Coutinho were to leave, Liverpool could probably tempt Milan to part with Suso, who is a similar type of player and scored seven league goals last term.

Arsenal:
Slim pickings here I think. Very slim. Samir Nasri is obviously surplus to requirements at City, but considering how he left, I don’t think any Arsenal fan would ever want to see him return. The last thing Arsenal need are more fairly decent squad players, so trying to find any former players that would fit the bill seems tough. I know this may seem ridiculous, but I honestly have to go for Fabianski. It is widely known that Cech’s talents are diminishing, and Ospina is no kind of replacement. Fabianski is by no means perfect, but is at least far better than the player Arsenal sold a few years ago. Honestly though, Arsenal fans, you got to help me out on this one, because Fabianski is the best I can come up with.

Man United:
Sean says that he’d like to see Welbeck back at United, and although I agree with him that it was sad to see him go at the time, the last thing United need is another attacking player (who doesn’t score enough goals) to stunt the development of Martial and Rashford. The fools among us would say Di Maria, but surely no one who invests time on Football 365 would ever believe that re-signing him would work second time round. Before West Ham pulled off one of the purchases of the summer, I would have said Hernandez to add cover for Lukaku, but now I don’t think United could do any worse than Josh King. He was phenomenal last season and would be a more than able deputy should Lukaku pick up a knock.

Everton:
I really struggled finding a decent, currently active, former Everton player who would be welcome back at the club. The only one I could think of is Fellaini, who has his critics but is definitely a handful and slightly further down the pecking order at United now Matic has arrived. I feel like there is a more obscure and appropriate answer out there though, but I’d need a little help from those more in the know.

This is the best I could come up with for these respective clubs. I’ve probably made some glaring oversights and errors so do call me out.
Henry Edwards

 

Mounting frustration at FSG
Having fought so hard to qualify for the Champions League, Liverpool fans were hopeful that with money available and CL football as a drawcard, this summer would see Liverpool take a big step to finally being able to compete with the big boys. How wrong things have gone.

The VVD saga is well known. The whole affair was handled like a bunch of amateurs. They pursued Keita all summer, and finally backed off when told that he would not be sold at any cost. Now that Leipzig have confirmed that he may well be available for a price, there has been no offer for him. Instead they are now after Seri, who by all accounts would also be a decent signing at a ridiculously low price. Except, are they…with a rumoured price of around 20 million, this should be a no brainer. Yet at the time of writing, there is no development here either. All this while Coutinho is certain to leave. My belief is that the owners are happy to make money in transfers rather then spending any money. They made a profit last season, they will certainly do so again this season. In fact, even when they spend over 50 million on Suarez and Carroll, the money was used from the sale of Torres.

Liverpool will never be able to compete with these clowns in charge. Hell, even Everton have spent this season, and thire record signing now costs more than Liverpool’s. By around 30%.

Another tough season awaits. My prediction is that we will get knocked out at the group stage of the CL and finish sixth.

One step forward, three back.
Shiraz (FSG out !!!), Johannesburg

 

Is it always clever to keep hold of players?
Having just read Ralph Krueger’s fiery statement, I feel compelled to congratulate Southampton on making their stand but question whether it really is the right thing to do. This summer’s transfer window seems to have been dominated by wantaway players and clubs deciding to hold on to their ‘assets’ despite big money being on offer. It’s a very fine line between ballsy and reckless.

He’s no doubt one of the better defenders in the league but if teams really are willing to pay upwards of £60m for Virgil van Dijk I would be inclined to sell him. He clearly doesn’t want to stay and having the constant distraction of a miserable star ‘rotting in the reserves’ is never healthy for a team Southampton have made some smart moves in recent transfer windows but they’ve not invested heavily this summer and it if they want to make the jump from mid table to challenging for Europe that squad needs an extra sprinkling of quality. It would seem odd to sell your best player to get better but in this case two £30 million additions could be just what they need.

The situation at Arsenal however is a different kettle of fish, Wenger also seems hell bent on keeping hold of players who want out and are 12 months away from leaving for free. Keeping Alexis Sanchez for the last year of his contract may cost the club financially but the impact he can have on the team this season far out ways the benefit of another £40/50/60 million in the bank. Bear in mind that at 28 his next contract will probably cover his inevitable decline as a player and is a risk in itself, it’s the right call. The same can’t be said for Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain who, for all the talent in the world, is unable to consistently perform and has seemingly decided he’s good enough to play in central midfield despite not being able to nail down a position at wing back. Supposedly turning down £35 million seems ludicrous even in the current market, add in the fact that Ozil, Gibbs and Wilshere are also potentially walking for nothing next year I can’t quite make sense of this one either.

No one likes to lose good players, especially to a rival team, but sometimes the head should rule the heart.
Tom (hoping the Ox doesn’t turn into the next Gerrard)

 

Spurs should give Rose money to other first-teamers
I’ve come to the conclusion that Spurs should sell Danny Rose and reinvest the money in the team. However, I don’t mean in new signings, I think the club should use a good chunk of that money (£110-£120m) in giving our star players a 25-30% pay bump.

We could use the money to sign 2-3 players but I can’t think of a single one who would be guaranteed to improve our team. New signings are always a risk. Rose will be a loss but Trippier is equally exciting in attack and Ben Davies is a solid replacement for Rose on the left.

Sign a promising youngster as cover for Ben Davies and work on bringing him through the ranks but the majority of money should go to the players who have done such a fantastic job so far rather than gambling on the likes of Ross Barkley.

It may seem like a radical approach but I actually think it would be a very sensible one. Keeping our star players happy and paying them their current value in wages is worth far more than any new signing in my opinion.
David

 

Bravo Mediawatch
I have to say, I do love the Mediawatch segment. I read it every morning as I login to work with my coffee and banana bread – breakfast of champions.

I thought about being a sports writer in my younger days but figured that I didn’t have the requisite English skills to succeed…and I think to myself now, how do these journalists have jobs?! The sheer level of made up stories, insights, learnings, opinions is depressing. Why cant we get a proper educated analysis on tactics or why cant we just have honest news to say, we’ve heard that Player A might be going to Club X but none of our sources can confirm the story. I would much rather read that than ’12 reasons why Moratas WAG is SUNsational’.

I saw in your last piece on Mediawatch about the Zonal marking and how there is a fundamental flaw with it…this is just such lazy work, quoting 2 professionals but not naming them or actually going in to reasons. Why not give us tactical breakdown of the differences, what successful teams do when using zonal marking, the type of players you need, what the roles are etc etc.

Rant over.

In other news Spurs signed Sigurdsson for 9M in 2012 and couldn’t get a game. Five years on and hes now apparently worth 45M because hes good at kicking a dead ball. Remember when Everton had no money. You’re welcome.
Scott, Perth