Some observations about Barça’s performances in the first 5 months of this 2019-2020 season, Valverde’s 3rd year.
Watching Barça in LaLiga the last 2 seasons was similar to watching one of those superhero movies.
You know there may be a plot twist & suffering (the opponent dominating ball possession for a couple minutes, Ter Stegen making an incredible save), you know that specific characters will provide key contributions (Valverde making accurate substitutions, Messi doing some magic), but you also know that, in the end, the superhero will most probably win.
At least that’s how I personally experienced it.
But this season is, so far, probably the most disappointing one under Valverde. As said once, this team is nor brilliant nor bad : it is inconsistent on individual and collective levels. Most players & the team as a whole alternate a couple of good/excellent performances with some average/bad ones.
The constant changes of gameplans (and, to be fair, injuries of key players like Dembélé, Alba or Arthur) didn’t help. Compare the current situation to the previous 2 seasons. Usually, by December, Valverde had already :
– found his main system (442 the 1st season, 433 the 2nd one).
– found the magical switch to make everything tick : Paulinho to add attacking threat from midfield, Rakitic in the double pivot to free & cover Busquets (1st season), dropping Coutinho for Arthur to bring more consistency in midfield while using Rakitic to compensate Messi’s moves on the right (2nd season).
Maybe it wasn’t sexy, but it was solid & it worked. And if any challenges appeared during a game, coach or some specific players were stepping up to solve the problem.
Now Ter Stegen is having a very average start of the season (compared to his standards) and Valverde’s tactical interventions look less consistently effective than before (How can you not find a way to score against an opponent that has his defense at the halfway line, I’m still wondering…).
But all of this tension around the team was a bit predictable, right ? Seeing how things ended last season and the lack of deep squad/staff overhaul, it’s always been clear to me that, unless there were clear improvements based on radical line-up & system changes, the doubts & criticism were going to grow very quickly. Fans & media were watching Barça while holding torches & pitchforks, ready to spot any weakness and strike.
And that’s where Valverde’s lack of ambition disappointed me 👇🏽
In all of the friendly games & the 1st month of official games, he made a radical change. Wide wingers, high CMs, positional play, very aggressive pressing, new patterns of play… Was I dreaming? 😳
Despite some bad results (Osasuna, Bilbao), the team played some of the best fútbol I’ve seen these last 3 years (Napoli, Betis, Valencia).
But that’s the problem when you get excited like that. When you’re tricked to truly believe in something, your frustration is only bigger when it fails to happen…
Suárez & Messi came back from injury and that was it. End of the experiment. Back to last season’s asymmetrical 433, back to the double pivot in some specific games, back to the usual pressing problems…
All in all, unless some dramatic change occurs, I feel like this season may be a remake of the previous one.
It’s basically the same approach & tools, only with De Jong & Griezmann instead of Rakitic & Coutinho (in terms of gala 11). Will that be enough to perform & compete for UCL? I doubt it.
The other factor to keep in mind is how Zidane seems to have found the right formula to solve its structural problems & make Real Madrid play as a (solid) team : unlike the previous seasons, they may be a serious contender for LaLiga this time.
Simply put, I feel like the other big contenders in Spain & Europe are growing stronger, while Barça is offering more of the same.
Visca Barça 💪🏽🔵🔴
If you like this kind of analysis, please consider subscribing. You can also follow me on Twitter, Facebook & Gumroad.
Captn ⚽ 
Hope this doesn’t come across wrong, but I’m relieved I’m not the only one who felt Ter Stegen was not having the best season (by his standards). Thought I was going nuts because no one else seemed to be saying anything. It must be his knee issues; I hope he’s able to come back from that successfully.
I must admit I have never been a huge fan of Valverde because he never innovates unless his hand is forced. It’s basically exactly what you’re saying–he only did all that interesting stuff in the beginning of the season because Messi and Suarez were out. A part of me wonders if there’s some unknown club politics limiting the sporting aspects. Like Rakitic’s strange situation where it was clear he wasn’t going to be a key part of the plans…until he suddenly was. Arthur’s injury had something to do with it, of course, but why not try Alena? Then there’s Vidal, who was clearly brought on as a “better Paulinho,” but Valverde also seems to have (mostly) moved past that idea, because Vidal isn’t playing as much as Paulinho was. (Not going to lie though, kind of hate it when Vidal is on b/c his positioning is so poor. I get he’s put on as practically a forward to score goals, but I just can’t stand it.) I also don’t understand why, if he won’t bench Suarez and play Griezmann as a 9 who can help with build-up, he can’t coach Griezmann to stay wide since the team desperately needs actual wingers (maybe he thinks Griezmann is too slow??). Possibly it’ll be better once Arthur comes back from injury (and Umtiti gets over his knee issues b/c while Lenglet exceeded expectations, I still think Umtiti is smarter and better than him), but at this point it almost feels as if Valverde’s just given up and hoping key players will carry him to the end of the season without too much embarrassment. The lack of strategic consistency, essentially forcing players to come up with solutions on the fly, feels that way.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Sorry for answering so late. I rarely get comments on the blog (tho it makes me happy when people comment in here) so I rarely check this section. I agree with most of what you said. Many things in common with the issues I mentioned. Now let’s hope Quique Setién gets to solve those issues and brings some new & fresh ideas.
LikeLike
Hey, no problem, longform blogging has kind of fallen out of favor for many, it seems like, but I’ve always preferred it over microblogging platforms like Twitter (too likely to turn toxic). I wasn’t expecting a reply. 🙂
I just read your post on Setien’s appointment and Valverde’s sacking. I’m not as outraged by how the dismissal was done because these big businesses are all ruthless and I have no illusions about any of them. But like you, I was astonished that the change happened at all, and I also have the niggling sense that something must’ve happened behind the scenes. My personal feeling is that despite public statements of support from Messi and Suarez, he might have actually lost the locker room. To be honest I kind of felt he had lost the locker room’s confidence ever since Anfield. I imagine you might not agree based on some of your tweets, but I didn’t buy Messi’s support of Valverde at the press conference last season. Bartomeu has admitted that he pushed for Valverde to stay over the summer: what better way to silence critics than to have your most high-profile, famous, and well-liked player to publicly support an under-fire coach? And lost confidence has nothing to do with liking a person; I imagine the players probably liked Valverde, but if anything, that personal connection will probably motivate them more to “protect” him even if they might have doubts about his suitability as a manager.
But then we come to the Supercopa loss, where the deciding goal came after Busquets got subbed off (I do not care who he got subbed off for, not touching that). So first, people have made too big a deal this season about Busquets’ benching/substitutions. As a person who likes Busquets, obviously I don’t enjoy seeing him absent or getting subbed off, but there was some necessary tinkering at the beginning of the season to test the new guys, and sure, Vidal has more in-the-box presence and frees Messi, and scored needed goals. Given that Busquets also had stomach problems and a fever, it’s perfectly possible too that the player is dealing with some undisclosed physical issues that Valverde needed to be aware of. All this made sense when shorn of drama. However, subbing off Busquets in the Supercopa made absolutely no sense to me. It was one of the team’s and therefore one of his best performances. Maybe Valverde thought Busquets was too tired to press effectively. However, the change seemed to have disoriented everyone and unfortunately the result of the sub was that the team conceded a goal almost immediately. It was not, based on the outcome, an effective substitution. (And I saw people claim he was subbed off because he lost the ball in the lead up to the equalizer, but that is false. De Jong’s pass got intercepted by an Atleti player; this can be easily verified through touch data from Whoscored. Plus you don’t sub people off for one mistake.) Busquets himself has never complained publicly and there aren’t even rumors of him being unhappy AFAIK, but he is second captain and well-liked in the locker room. Football is about egos but also relationships. If as a distant fan I’m not excited seeing him get subbed off, I don’t imagine his actual friends will be too pleased, especially if they don’t even have a win to justify the removal and the subsequent negative coverage by Spanish media. Quiet doubts could have gotten louder and overrode personal liking of Valverde.
Ok enough of that tin-hat stuff.😅 Re: your point about the board failing to make appropriate squad changes once they decided to keep Valverde–don’t you think they tried with signing De Jong, Griezmann, and Firpo, along with their attempt to offload Coutinho, Rakitic, and maybe Dembele, and sign Neymar? It really seemed to me based on the transfer market movement that they blamed certain players for that loss (particularly Coutinho; an entire Matchday episode was dedicated to him not making it at the club, and Matchday is the official “party line” for what happened last season) and wanted to move them on. Whether fans agree with that assessment is immaterial; that just seemed to be what the board had in mind. I guess I wouldn’t call it a “mistake” through inaction from the board; more like they tried and failed.
I’m very curious and nervous about how Setien will do at a club like Barcelona, with the players available. It’s almost a relief he won’t have to deal with the “rest Suarez” question because Suarez is getting enforce rest now, although I have to say that finding out he needed knee surgery again actually turned my frustration toward Valverde straight into anger. It’s one thing to keep him on for the connection with Messi, it’s quite another to actually be risking his health by refusing to show some authority and not play him for the full 90 every game.
Despite all the uncertainty, I’m also just excited to see whether he’ll be able to implement his ideas. I want to see more intelligent, positional football, plus the players I love (Messi, Busquets, Pique) to look as if they’re enjoying themselves again before they inevitably retire.
The length of my response shows why I don’t like Twitter. You probably think I’m nuts; please don’t feel obligated to reply. I’ll just close by saying I enjoy your insights.
LikeLike
Good lord, I think I was sleep-deprived and angrier than I thought I was about Valverde and all the politics surrounding Barcelona’s board in my previous reply. Sorry for spamming your blog with random conspiracy theories.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hahaha no problem, it’s all good
LikeLike