Like the clown without an audience who takes off his make-up in a seedy dressing room, the decline of FC Barcelona continues its course. The institutional speeches, delivered by Xavi Hernández from the bench and by Joan Laporta from the box, no longer deceive. From the invocation of Cruyffism to the football booty. From the triumphalism of the banner to the reality of Riyadh, capital of the country that the alleged value club contributes to whitewashing, walking among sheikhs, praising its democratic openness. lying
The Blaugrana club is still sick and it is Real Madrid who are in charge, sole ruler of a Super Cup final that ended 4-1 as it could end, like the infamous one in Lisbon. The organization is not making progress, with economic debts and moral and footballing debts that are increasingly unsustainable.
Yesterday, beyond the usual, but opportunistic, anger of social networks, a significant change was palpable: the rational Barcelona fans (there are some) wondered if the time has come to replace Xavi as coach. Ernesto Valverde must be laughing. He was sent off in the same competition after losing by one player against Atlético, who were leaders in the League and having won two (and a Cup). This is where the sins of this club begin. Believing yourself to be better than you are, clinging to the good times, as if by wearing the shirt your rivals would fall in your path.
It has ceased to be so. It's been too long. Football is present and future, but never past. This is not about reconstruction. It's almost a refoundation. Change the coach? But if there is no money to register players. Promote Rafa Márquez from the subsidiary? With what guarantees of success? With what arguments? Because he has a lot of godfathers in there?
Barça entered the game with a spare. Again. It doesn't exaggerate. The effect of that hopeful boo from Xavi at the end of the pre-Christmas game against Almeria has faded. too early In January
The game was very long for Barça, and short for Madrid, a sign that the first team suffered and the second had a good time. Cruyff applied in reverse. The white riot was so great that even Bellingham and Vinícius, author of three goals, for more Blaugrana torture, chained a couple of heel strikes in the face of the gallery of those who distill humiliation. you know what The only one who reprimanded him was Ancelotti, his coach.
If the bet is midfield and possessing the ball, you must protect it with cannibalistic zeal. But Barça's pressure to recover it was flaccid, it had the same tension of that skin that is starting to hang, a cruel symptom that the passage of time has no turning back. There is a point of ill-conceived nostalgia in the invocation of Cruyffism, a movement rightly mythologised, but which, as Guardiola and Luis Enrique knew how to do, required a reinterpretation in accordance with the evolution of the times. No revisionism can be detected in Xavi's Barça. It is a team that works on impulse, but that does not give the impression of solidity, neither tactically nor mentally.
The image that the market returned was eloquent. Laporta, these days surrounded by stalwarts brought from home, sharing seats with Florentino Pérez, the great traveling companion in the Superliga. The ally when rejecting the agreement with CVC that guaranteed Messi's continuity. Florentino is happy with this painless competition. Oh yes, the banner.
Barça, a club without money as everyone knows, has spent 30 million euros (and 31 in variables) to sign No matter where you look, this Barça is nowhere to be taken
