Barcelona: One year since the collapse against Liverpool
Barcelona suffered an embarrassing exit at the hands of Liverpool. One year since, where do the club stand?
May 7 marked the one-year anniversary of Barcelona blowing a 3-0 lead at Anfield and crashing out of the Champions League for a second consecutive year.
The loss against Liverpool marked a second consecutive humiliating exit after blowing a 4-1 lead away to Roma the season before. The aftermath of two such losses were not enough according to the supporters. A year removed, what has changed, if anything?
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The most significant change since then is the sacking of manager Ernesto Valverde although they did it begrudgingly. The Barcelona board continued to back him and it took a loss to Atletico Madrid in a mini-tournament in Saudi Arabia for the club to decide they had enough.
He was replaced by Quique Setién who, by all accounts, was not the first choice. Even before Valverde was let go, rumors were rampant that the club had met with Xavi to convince him to take over.
In the end, he decided to stay at Al-Saad because he wanted to have a fresh start and not come in during the middle of the season.
Under Setién, any improvement has been minimal providing evidence that the manage was not entirely to blame for Barcelona’s declining performances.
As far as the squad, the only significant departure was Philippe Coutinho. The Brazilian was loaned out to Bayern Munich right before the first game of the season against Athletic Bilbao.
They brought in Frenkie de Jong from Ajax but he has yet to fully find his place on the team and display the type of showings he did with the Dutch side.
Suffering back-to-back devastating knockouts would have meant the departure of not only the manager but those in the board room. Yet Josep Maria Bartomeu survived that and is maintaining a strangle hold on the presidency despite even more controversies this season.
In a lot of ways, the loss at Anfield exacerbated Barcelona’s problem. It further showed the weakness they had in Europe. Relying on Lionel Messi to solve all their problems works fine in La Liga but as good as he is, it’s not enough in Europe if no one else steps up.
That winning mentality Barcelona used to have has eroded and throwing money around to solve their problems, especially post-Neymar, has backfired. The team lacks an identity at the moment and it’s a mix-and-match of young and old with no real cohesiveness.
The loss was supposed to serve as a reflection and finally try to rectify what went wrong. They haven’t and the Champions League has become an obsession. An obsession that only puts more pressure on the players and manager made worse by Real Madrid’s success.
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Post-Anfield, little has changed because those responsible for making the choices that guide the club are still in charge and they seem to be more worried about their legacy than ensuring the team’s success on the pitch.