Barcelona in crisis: No identity, no world class kids and Paulinho replacing Neymar — how Nou Camp giants have fallen
Comprehensive 5-1 defeat in Spanish Super Cup to Real Madrid led Catalan hero Gerard Pique to admit he finally feels 'inferior'
IN CASE it wasn’t already clear, the Spanish Super Cup annihilation confirmed it: Barcelona are a club in crisis.
Just two years after winning the Treble and looking set to embark on world domination, the club is full of ageing stars, bereft of emerging talent and appear to have lost their way on the transfer market.
They are more reliant on Lionel Messi than ever — and the five-time Ballon d'Or-winners is now 30.
A turbulent summer started with the acrimonious departure of the man they intended to build their future around in Neymar to Paris Saint-Germain for £198million.
And just 12 days later, the La Liga side announce they have made former Tottenham flop Paulinho their fourth-highest signing of all-time at £36.4m.
No 1 Nou Camp cheerleader Gerard Pique admitted for the first time in his nine years at the club that he feels “inferior” to Real Madrid.
And the Catalans' demise has been been paralleled by the rise of their arch-rivals — whose success has been built on the Barcelona blueprint.
The Real Madrid squad is full of young, Spanish talent in Nacho, Isco, Lucas Vazquez and Marco Asensio.
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And even in the dug-out they followed the Barca model.
In 2008, a struggling Barcelona put their faith their former captain and youth team coach — Pep Guardiola.
Now Real Madrid are led by their former star and youth team coach, Zinedine Zidane.
But the biggest irony is that the final nail in the coffin was delivered by Asensio, a player the Catalans refused to pay £4m to sign as a youngster.
Real Madrid are out Barcelonaing Barcelona.
Los Blancos are younger, with a wealth of talent at their disposal and have won the Champions League as often in the past four years as the Catalans have in the entire supposed decade of glory.
Barcelona are even struggling to attract top talent to the Nou Camp, with Marco Verratti having opted to stay at PSG — and a deal for Philippe Coutinho looking less likely every day.
Three years after Guardiola was named manager, Barcelona became the best side on the planet.
And, for many, the greatest of all-time.
They won the Champions League for a second time in three years, using a team made up of mainly world class academy graduates.
Victor Valdes, Pique, Carles Puyol, Sergio Busquets, Xavi, Andres Iniesta, Pedro and Messi.
With the likes of Bojan, Thiago Alcantara and Marc Bartra available in reserve.
In 2012, Tito Vilanova fielded an entire XI of academy stars during a 4-0 victory over Levante.
Fast forward to 2017, and the core of the team is made up of the same players — minus those who have retired — and the replacement have not been anywhere near good enough.
Busquets is the youngest truly world class talent available, and he’s 29.
The famed La Masia has been abandoned.
Barcelona have lost Jordi Mboula, 18, to Monaco and 16-year-old Eric Garcia to Manchester City this summer.
Since 2013, when Neymar arrived from Santos and Tata Martino was named as manager, the focus has been on bringing in their own ‘Galacticos’.
Luis Suarez followed the next summer and Barcelona had two of the four most expensive players of all-time.
Success was immediate with the incredible MSN frontline delivering the Treble in their first season together.
However, what made Guardiola’s side so good was that they were never overly reliant on any one player — no matter how good Messi may have been.
In the 2015-16, the attacking trio suffered a month-long goal scoring lull midway through the season, and it would see them eliminated from the Champions League a nine-point gap at the top of La Liga wiped out.
Manager Luis Enrique tried to remedy that by bringing in squad players Samuel Umtiti, Lucas Digne, Andre Gomes and Paco Alcacer in a busy summer.
But all four have been overwhelmed and look well below the level required.
The right-back slot was the problem area all last season, so they signed Nelson Semedo from Benfica.
But reports emanating from the Catalan press suggest some players believe there are academy stars with more quality than the Portugal international.
Another one stand out player in La Masia — 19-year-old central midfielder Carles Alena — has seen his chances of first team football come under threat following the bizarre arrival of Paulinho.
Barcelona’s famous motto is “More than a club” — which is why being accused of being “Without A Soul” as how one Catalan newspaper put it, is as bad as it gets.
Now, the 2015 Treble success look more like a last hurrah, rather than the start of a dynasty.
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