If you were looking to write a detailed account of all the mistakes Barcelona have made in the past decade, you’d be advised to start by turning the Forest of Dean into pulp. Because you’re going to need a lot of paper.
And while it would be unfair to lambast the club for failing to replace the legendary Xavi Hernandez – there are few players in the modern era who can claim to have influenced the game as much as the World Cup-winning, tika-taka-embodying Catalan – but Barcelona did, at one point, have a midfielder who would have done a better job than most of stepping into Xavi’s boots.
And they let him go.
“I think he is an extraordinary player,” Xavi said of a young Thiago Alcantara in 2013, via The Guardian.
“Thiago is not just a player for the future but is someone who can make an impact right now as well.”
If only Barcelona had listened to their legendary number six. Because, after failing to give one of Europe’s most promising young playmakers any sort of assurances over his first-team role at Camp Nou, Thiago was packing his bags, swapping Barca for Bayern Munich just months after Xavi had tipped his fellow La Masia graduate for a bright future in red and blue.
Could Liverpool’s Thiago Alcantara return to Barcelona under Xavi?
Eight years on, Xavi is back where he belongs, riding back into town like a shining knight on a noble steed.
And the man who has come to embody everything we grew to love about that all-conquering Barcelona side of the Pep Guardiola era wasted little time, in his new role as head coach, in making clear the importance of bringing tradition back to a club that sold its soul for a few magic beans and a £140 million Brazilian.
After luring 38-year-old former teammate Dani Alves back to Camp Nou for one last swansong, Sport claims Xavi has held talks with president Joan Laporta to express his desire to bring back another star with Barca blood coursing through his veins.
How Liverpool feel about parting with Thiago after just 14 injury-hit months on Merseyside remains to be seen.
But while Xavi became the symbol of Guardiola’s Barcelona, it’s tempting to wonder whether Thiago could play that same role under Xavi himself.
“Xavi is eternal,” Thiago said of Xavi, his old teammate and, who knows, perhaps his future manager too (Bleacher Report).
“Even when he is not at his very best level physically, he plays a kind of football that gives oxygen to a team. It makes me sad to think I won’t be able to watch Xavi any more. He is football. He is one of those players that has made Barcelona what it is today.”
Many at Camp Nou hope Xavi can make Barcelona what it is tomorrow as well.
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