The League started badly for Barça with that draw at the Camp Nou against Rayo and the certainty that there are still essential issues to improve in the squad. The market remains open until August 31 and Xavi He continues to ask for signings to strengthen his project, despite the fact that more than 200 million euros have been invested.
But it’s not enough. He wants more. With seven additions (two in winter and five in this frenetic summer) the coach is still not pleased, who calls for the addition of two full-backs to strengthen the defense after insisting, at the same time, on the arrival of Bernard Silvathe Manchester City midfielder, even though he is valued at 100 million euros.
Barça continues incomplete in the field. And in the locker room. Time is upon Mateu Alemany, the club’s director of football, who has supervised, together with Jordi Cruyff, sports director, the long and deep reconstruction of the squad.
Long because it started in January (Ferran Torres y Aubameyang there were then two immediate signings to save the season and sneak into the Champions League) and deep because with Lewandowski, Koundé y Raphinha The sensitive areas of the project were underpinned (a nine, a central and offensive dynamite to minimize dependence on the unpredictable Dembélé), in addition to filling the closet with new and cheap resources: Kessié and Christensen arrived at the Camp Nou for free.
But Xavi asks for more. Xavi considers that he needs more. In his initial plan, the arrival of two full-backs was already noted. Azpilicueta would have been wonderful on the right flank because he would have contributed skill, hierarchy and leadership in the locker room, as well as versatility because he also knows life in the back line.
The hole left by Azpilicueta’s refusal
Although the Navarrese (32 years old), after waiting for Barça, decided not to move from Stamford Bridge where he is captain and symbol of Chelsea after chaining 10 seasons full of commitment. He left, therefore, a hole to fill for the Barca coach, who must now look towards second or third options.
On the left wing more of the same. Mark Alonsothe Chelsea winger, is the chosen one, but Barça must first lighten the wage bill and accept fair play because Koundé not registered yet. As he intended with Azpilicueta, Xavi needs players with an immediate impact to compete with Jordi Albathe only player who has not doubled the position in that luxurious template that he has in hand.
Bet on immediate impact
Y Mark Alonso meets that profile that the technician demands in that area of the field where he does not see it convenient to bet on a course of such demand for Bucket (18 years old), the young man who comes from La Masia. There is no time for apprenticeships because Xavi he also knows, once the level of demand has been raised, that he does not have time. It is now or now.
This need is urgent because at Barça they coincided, for example, in the duel against Rayo with Sergio Robert (right back invented by Luis Enrique) and Jordi Alba (sole owner left for over a decade now). Symptom that the renewal has not reached that position, which has acquired a spectacular significance in modern football.
The coach needs to update and improve the full-backs, an essential factor in modern football
Just look at the City of Guardiola o al Liverpool de Klopp, where the defensive wings are capital in the game structure. Barça has become outdated. And Xavi, aware of this deficit, demands an economic effort (it would be, at least, between 20 and 25 million for the two new pieces) to regenerate the bands before the market closes on August 31.
The viability of the latest squad reform depends on finding a market for Dest, Frenkie de Jong and Memphis, in addition to adjusting the salary fair play
And for the technician’s happiness to be complete, it would suffice what he considers to be the essential arrival of Bernard Silvaan interior that does adjust to what he demands, capable as the Portuguese is of adapting to different roles, willing as he is to leave Manchester and discover the Spanish League.
Xavi also needs an experienced midfielder like the Portuguese (28 years old) to contrast the great youthful talent of Gavi (18) and not rely solely on the magic of Pedri (19), whose injuries last season left the team in the dark.
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But those last-minute plans to complete the squad with a final effort are all pending fitting the salary fair play, in addition, of course, to the departures (Memphis, Dest, who was not called up against Rayo, Umtiti and Braithwaite and, maybe Frenkie de Jong or Aubameyang) will be done before the 31st.
For this reason, Xavi insists and pushes. He insists on re-balancing a squad that is unbalanced (there is not, for example, a single left-handed center-back or left-back beyond Alba) and presses to have the necessary resources to dethrone Madrid in the League.