In my last post I tried to answer the question: Can Barcelona form a strong team around Messi or with Messi? On the pitch, the answer is an obvious yes. But, off the pitch and in the locker room, Barcelona was a rotten club. One of the people most responsible for that is Lionel Messi.

Now, when I say that Messi is responsible for Barcelona's decline, I am not speculating, I am not overanalyzing. I am making a statement that Messi, himself, would agree with.

While he is never on Barcelona's board, Messi has an unspoken veto, according to Simon Kuper in his book The Barcelona Complex: Lionel Messi and the Making--and Unmaking--of the World's Greatest Soccer Club. It's not even always unspoken as Messi would often take the initiative and request a transfer, just like he did with Neymar in 2019. Bartomeu of course made noise and movement in the summer to pretend that he was trying to make that happen.

In the same book, Kuper talked about visiting the office of Barcelona's coach at the time, Ernesto Valverde. Valverde managed Barcelona for three years, yet according to Kuper, his office at the club lacked any signs of that or even signs that it was even Valverde's office as it lacked any sort of personality. The office only had a calendar on the wall displaying Barcelona's fixtures. Those are signs of many who know he isn't staying or someone whose job is a marginal function, just a job title with an insignificant role.

In the interview, Valverde told Kuper that a coach's job in football is losing its effect on the game, and said something very dangerous stating "The great players analyze the game better than I do", before correcting himself quickly and instead saying "Instead of analyzing I'd say they interpret play. On the field you can't think. You must play". The dangerous part is that the players agree with him.

Valverde and the players seemed to have reached an agreement that he wouldn't be telling the team how to play, he'd only take care of minor details. In return, of course, Messi and Co. would take responsibility when they, a promise they actually kept. That's why when Messi was giving a talk at halftime away in Anfield he said

We have to start strong. Remember, Rome was our fault. Nobody else’s. We mustn’t let the same thing happen. It was our fault and nobody else’s.

"It was our fault and nobody else’s.", this wasn't a lie and Messi said it over and over in the media later. The problem is when those moments extend beyond just players taking responsibility because they have the power and become actually harmful to the development of the club and its players as a whole.

Kuper interviewed Barcelona's manager Quique Setién when the latter talked about a certain incident during a game against Real Betis. Setién had started Junior Firpo as a left-back over Alba and during halftime, Junior Firpo asked Messi what he thought.

"What do you think I think?", Messi snapped at Setién since Firpo was playing over his friend Alba, who was also the player who knew when to run for Messi's long passes. Messi told Setién that he needed to "play your best players" because it "isn't a youth team". Soon after halftime, Alba replaced Firpo. The problem is this is not a way to coach a team, this is the team handling the coach.

Messi's Expansion

If you think of that last incident, you could easily conclude that no one but Messi would have the power to say and do something like that and walk away without any punishment. This is the result of a club lacking vision and direction, it leaves a big space for Messi to expand.

Yes, it is the fault of the club's board and management to fill that space, but when Messi found the space, he expanded within it. Messi didn't push the wheel at first but kept it rolling afterwards. This is very expected from a football player with no background when it comes to management so of course, he'd be shortsighted and thinking only of the next player. This doesn't absolve Messi from his responsibility.

Obviously, the objection is who the hell is Firpo for us to care about him so much? This is where I need you to think of three things

• Who Firpo was before coming to Barcelona, how Barcelona's fans loved him before coming. And finally how they loved for him to come and put Alba on the bench.

• This is one incident. We don't know how many similar incidents happened since 2017.

• If you were a young player like Firpo, what would you do when you hear something like that coming from the team's captain and arguably the best player in its history? Would you be in a state of mind allowing you to be useful to the team? I mean if the captain doesn't want you, what are you even doing here then?

That is the staggering cost of keeping a genius.

Handling Messi

What Barcelona never realized, like many clubs before and after, is that legendary and genius players require more thorough planning, not less. You need to take care and pay more attention to the player so he wouldn't reach a point where he'd be bigger than the coach and arguably the club itself. Or even when you reach that point, you'd hire people who know how to handle him.

This takes us back to the question, knowing all we know about Messi's situation at Barcelona in the late years, can Barcelona form a strong team around Messi or with Messi? The answer is yes. The legendary star on the pitch requires a legendary star on the sideline. This doesn't mean someone who'd fight with Messi, just means someone with history and leverage at the club, just like Xavi. Someone who can talk and discuss with the legendary star. That's Xavi's biggest attribute, but I am not so sure about the other attributes if I am honest.

Either that or you just surrender to the star, admitting that he'd become too big for you to handle, thus, it's impossible to have the time, planning, and execution needed to form a good team around said star.

In Conclusion

It's not fair to fully blame Messi, Pique, Alba, and Busquets for Barcelona's fall as the board and management are still the main cause behind it. The board's lack of anything of value and its constant consumption in conspiracy wars left a big gap that the players shouldn't have expanded into or at least handled that expansion better. The board's complete incompetence doesn't mean anyone should abuse their power.

This entire series started because I was confused about how I should feel about Pique's retirement. After going through all of this, I think I found the perfect way to describe my feelings toward Pique's retirement:

I am very sad that I am very glad that Pique left.