Barcelona doesn’t need Messi

Kriralok Desk: Barcelona started to achieve success without Lionel Messi. They won the Spanish Super Copa and La Liga titles this season. Which indicates the beginning of the new era of Barcelona. Catalan fans are now excited to return to Barca’s success with the hand of coach Xavi Hernandez.

Messi left Barcelona in September 2021. Messi has won 34 titles as the best player in Barca’s history. He scored a record 672 goals in a career of 17 seasons in the senior team. Although most of Messi’s career has been covered by Barca’s referee buying scandal. The investigation is going on. As a result, controversies has arisen about Messi’s achievements.

Messi was forced to leave the team due to the financial strain of Barcelona. Messi won the Copa del Rey in Barca’s last season. Barcelona did not win any title in the first season after Messi. Barcelona’s first season without Messi had a rough start. At one point, Xavi Hernandez came forward to save Barca, who fell to the 11th position in La Liga. He is also a legendary player of Barcelona and Spain. In November 2021, Xavi embarked on a mission to return to Barca. No title was won in the first season. But by making the team runner-up in La Liga, he fueled confidence. To return to success in the 2022-23 season, Xavi’s team included Robert Lewandowski, Jules Kunde, Rafinha, Frank Lacy and Andreas Christensen, the traditional team of Spain.

From the beginning of the 2022-23 season, Xavi entered the field with the aim of winning the title as a team with Barcelona. Results come in January. After a year and a half, Barcelona won the first title. Barca beat Real Madrid in Saudi Arabia to win the Spanish Super Copa. And recently, Barcelona won the La Liga title with four matches in hand.

Barcelona have won the domestic double. But their dreams are bigger. Barca is one of the most successful teams in Europe. Won the UEFA Champions League five times. Four of which came in the playing era of Messi and Xavi. After 2014-15, Barca could not win any UEFA Champions League title. And in the last two seasons, Barca has been eliminated from the group stage of Europe’s best club competition. Placed in the second row of the Europa League. There too in two seasons their run did not progress beyond the quarter finals.

Barcelona wants success in the Champions League next season. So many people think that Messi is needed. But in Barcelona, ​​Messi has cried for the success of the Champions League since 2015. During his time, Barcelona was defeated by Bayern Munich by eight goals. Lost to Liverpool, Roma and Juventus. Messi is now a PSG player. Messi failed there too. Messi’s PSG has been eliminated from the knockout phase in both seasons. But before Messi left, PSG played two consecutive seasons in the final and semi-final of the Champions League.

With the inclusion of Messi, PSG is gradually at the bottom. That’s why PSG fans are hearing the two voices regularly. In such a situation, PSG is losing interest in maintaining the relationship with Messi. Messi’s contract with PSG ends next June. Chances of a new contract are low. In such a situation, an offer of 400 million euros of annual remuneration has come from Saudi Arabia. American Inter Miami also wants to bring him to the team. But Messi wants to stay in Europe. However, no European club has come forward with an offer for Messi.

It is heard that Messi is returning to Barcelona. But after beating Espanyol to win La Liga, Barca president Juan Laporta said, “We have already started working on the next season’s team formation. Hope to be able to form a strong team. We have to plan strictly based on principles, because next season we have to organize our team according to the principles of fair-play. We are working tirelessly to have a more competitive team next season.”

Barca has been suffering from financial problems for a long time. Barcelona took loans to cut costs. They sold their own TV channel. Besides, Barca has tried to solve the situation by determining the salary structure of the footballers, selling merchandising and bringing new sponsorships. According to the rules of La Liga, 70 percent of the budget of each season can be spent on the salaries of footballers. Barca has rushed the players’ salary to comply with the rules of La Liga. They have also recently handed over a ‘plan’ to La Liga that includes a balance of income and expenditure. It took Barca to get La Liga’s green-signal to bring in Messi. But the ‘possibility plan’ sent by Barca has been rejected by the La Liga authorities. Barcelona still needs to reduce costs of about 200 million euros to balance income and expenses. If this situation is not overcome, it will not be possible for the club to buy and register new players.

Barcelona asked for three years to cut costs as directed by La Liga. With that, Barca hoped that the La Liga authorities would assist them in rebalancing the accounts at the Camp Nou through a proposed ‘plan of possibilities’.

But Javier Tebas has made it clear that the Catalan authorities must balance their income and expenditure within a very short period of time (before the end of this season). He called on Barcelona, ​​like other La Liga clubs, to abide by the law.

As a result, not only the plan to return Messi, but also the registration of new and young players of La Masia, the club authorities are worried. Next season, Gavi, Jordi Alba, Sergio Busquets are on the possible list to leave the team.

The Barcelona president talked about trying to bring Messi back, but did not actually take any action. He has instead signed with Brazil’s Firminho for the new season. Trying to bring Manchester City’s Ikai Gundogan. Barcelona is also trying to buy Vitor Roqui, the hero of Brazil’s Youth Copa victory. Compared to that, the initiative to return Messi to Barca is still not public. Everything is in the power of the media.

The president of Barca has said that they must follow the principles of La Liga. In that case, the talk of trying to bring Messi back indicates that the real possibility is low. And besides, even with Messi, Barca had to stay without a trophy in the Champions League for six seasons. PSG has also suffered for two seasons. On the other hand, Barca started to get success under Xavi. So it remains to be seen whether the Barcelona president will take any new risk by returning Messi.

Kri/sp-002