Trincao (on loan)

[DonAK]

So you want Neymar back?

I would lie if I said I wouldn't consider it. Either that or Mané. I believe a LW really is important to make the forward line balanced again.

Signing Lautaro would mean either playing Lautaro or Griezmann out of position, and again, signing a forward with one good season under his belt for an enormous amount of money.

I'm having second thoughts about it.

 

[Riordon]

I would lie if I said I wouldn't consider it. Either that or Mané. I believe a LW really is important to make the forward line balanced again.

Signing Lautaro would mean either playing Lautaro or Griezmann out of position, and again, signing a forward with one good season under his belt for an enormous amount of money.

I'm having second thoughts about it.

Agree, if we go for Lautaro or another 9, then Griezmann become redundant and played out of position. Even though Griez is not my type of 9, since I prefer more traditional 9’s like Suarez, Eto’o, Aguero and so on, we are probably better off if we go for Griezmann as the 9 and buy a LW.

That Mane is not for sale and I don’t want to pay huge sums for Neymar (though he is probably in his prime now) is another thing.

Who are realistic guys for that LW position? Maybe Sancho? Rashford does a lot of things I like but not sure if he is good enough or consistent right now.

Sancho has really stepped it up lately and I have followed him since seeing him at Camp Nou but don’t know about those Dortmund guys

 

[DonAK]

Agree, if we go for Lautaro or another 9, then Griezmann become redundant and played out of position. Even though Griez is not my type of 9, since I prefer more traditional 9’s like Suarez, Eto’o, Aguero and so on, we are probably better off if we go for Griezmann as the 9 and buy a LW.

That Mane is not for sale and I don’t want to pay huge sums for Neymar (though he is probably in his prime now) is another thing.

Who are realistic guys for that LW position? Maybe Sancho? Rashford does a lot of things I like but not sure if he is good enough or consistent right now.

Sancho has really stepped it up lately and I have followed him since seeing him at Camp Nou but don’t know about those Dortmund guys

Rashford signed a new contract and would probably be more expensive than Neymar, and is inconsistent and might struggle to adapt.

Sancho will be very expensive and I just don't want to spend 120m+ on a 20 year old kid that you don't know if he'll succeed and might need the right conditions for him to succeed which Barcelona just isn't right now.

 

[LABarcaFan]

Rey Manaj is Barça B signing. We'l probably go after Lautaro. We shouldn't waste our time and money with Neymar though after what happened yesterday I could see Bartomeu trying to do Messi another favour.

Rey Manaj will turn 23 on Feb.24 and considering that all our Barca - B players are 19 and 20 y.o. that signing tells me that they will use him more often with the first team. We will see.

As of Lautaro, all I can say is this.
Back in the days, I was opposing the signings of Dembele, Neymar and Griezmann and it turned out that I was right. Way to much money thrown in vain. The situation with Martinez is sugesting me that it will be another wrong signing. It is just my inner feeling.
Twelve goals and three assists in 20 games is not that bad of a stats, but... he has collected also seven (7) yellow cards and two (2) reds. That is an alarming sign to me. It shows that the guy has very deep mental problems, which my come from his childhood days. I can understand many local Barcelona fans who want to see him at Camp Nou, because he is Hispanic. But there may be a lots of strings attached to him. Neymar has the same exactly problems and that mentality and mental issues are the reason he can not unleash his talent. But to tell you honestly, if I have to choose one of them, I will go with Lautaro. At least, he is less loco that the Brazilian.

 

[LABarcaFan]

I would lie if I said I wouldn't consider it. Either that or Mané. I believe a LW really is important to make the forward line balanced again.

Signing Lautaro would mean either playing Lautaro or Griezmann out of position, and again, signing a forward with one good season under his belt for an enormous amount of money.

I'm having second thoughts about it.

Why it will mean playing either one of them out of position?
Lautaro is a central forward. Messi will play as a RW, Ansu Fati as a LW. And behind them we will have A.Melo and F. de Jong as a central midfielders and the Brazilian Matheus Pereira as attacking. Not a bad formation at all. But, I will personally prefer another striker instead of Lautaro. If you ask where Griezmann will play, I will say in Segunda Division.

 

[El Guaje]

Agree, if we go for Lautaro or another 9, then Griezmann become redundant and played out of position. Even though Griez is not my type of 9, since I prefer more traditional 9’s like Suarez, Eto’o, Aguero and so on, we are probably better off if we go for Griezmann as the 9 and buy a LW.

That Mane is not for sale and I don’t want to pay huge sums for Neymar (though he is probably in his prime now) is another thing.

Who are realistic guys for that LW position? Maybe Sancho? Rashford does a lot of things I like but not sure if he is good enough or consistent right now.

Sancho has really stepped it up lately and I have followed him since seeing him at Camp Nou but don’t know about those Dortmund guys

Imo Son would be amazing.

Sell Rakitic, Busquets and Suarez. Bring Son and Ziyech.

 

[Andresito]

Rey Manaj will turn 23 on Feb.24 and considering that all our Barca - B players are 19 and 20 y.o. that signing tells me that they will use him more often with the first team. We will see.

That doesn't make sense.

 

[gregorrin10]

Imo Son would be amazing.

Sell Rakitic, Busquets and Suarez. Bring Son and Ziyech.

Really surprised how no one snapped up Ziyech yet. I honestly thought he would be the first one to go after De J and De L out of Ajax. Had all the feels of a typical Bayern transfer...30M nice and cheap (while we and United keep wasting hundreds of millions on lesser players). I already saw Ziyech as Robben's heir, it made perfect sense to me last summer already, especially after Robbery both went. Maybe it will still happen this summer though, especially if Ten Hag ends up returning there, in that case i'm 100% it actually will happen.

On the other hand though, now the situation is a bit different, Bayern seem to still be determined to sign Sane, who is undoubtebly still their number one summer target, plus they still have Coman and Gnabry, AND Coutinho and Perisic on loan, but I don't think they'll sign any one of them, maybe Perisic because his option to buy is only like 25M, but he also got himself injured for 2 months now, before this injury I would've said Bayern are gonna use the option to buy for sure, cause he's been good for them, but now it's questionable. Anyway, I could totally see Bayern getting Ten Hag, then buying Sane and Ziyech, and sell Gnabry, alongside not signing Coutinho of course, which is almost a certainty. So they'd have Sane, Coman, Perisic and Ziyech for the wings, with all of them except Ziyech able to play both LW/LM and RW/RM.

 

[Laplacian]

Imo Son would be amazing.

Sell Rakitic, Busquets and Suarez. Bring Son and Ziyech.

Son is a far less talented Ousmane Dembele. Basically a player who thrives on open space and is shit on tight spaces. Inconsistent too. A player like Sancho or Sané is a better fit.

 

[Messi983]

I would lie if I said I wouldn't consider it. Either that or Mané. I believe a LW really is important to make the forward line balanced again.

Signing Lautaro would mean either playing Lautaro or Griezmann out of position, and again, signing a forward with one good season under his belt for an enormous amount of money.

I'm having second thoughts about it.

I've said before I'm also not totally sold on spending 100m+ on Lautaro. Sure he's a very good player and I would gladly take him if we wouldn't already have Griezmann but now I'm not sure. Also, I don't see Suarez leaving this summer and he'll still start most games next season so don't know how to get all of Messi, Suarez, Lautaro and Griezmann in the lineup at the same time. The only way I would go all out on Lautaro is if Suarez will leave.

With Lautaro replacing Suarez we could also play 3-5-2 in some games (but for that to happen we would need at least two new good CBs though one of them could be Todibo). I'm not really a fan of this system but think something like this could work.

---------MATS-------
--Todibo-CB*-Lenglet--
Semedo-------------Alba
---FDJ---CM**/Arthur----
--------Messi-----------
----Lautaro---Griezmann

* fast, physical CB like Upamecano
** a good ball-wining CM who is good on the ball and can also go forward. Arthur can play when we would need more control.

Defensively Griezmann and Lautaro would both track back with Messi staying forward and offensively they are all versatile so they could interchange positions a lot.

Messi is still our RW on paper but he always moves centrally during the games so as long as he's here we won't get a balanced 4-3-3 unless we start to use him as a false 9 again.


But I would still prefer to get someone like Werner or Osimhen and save some money for a CB and a midfielder (those positions are both a priority over a new striker for me) or not bring an expensive #9 this summer at all and go all out on Haaland in 2021 when his release clause is apparently just 75m. I'm sure Bartomeu will want to bring (another) big name forward in a year before elections though so it's either Lautaro or Neymar imo. And between the two I would always choose Lautaro because he's younger, cheaper and (after what happened recently not the least important) bringing back Neymar would further increase the power of veteran players in the locker room and longterm set our required rebuild another few years back.

Forget about Mane, he and other L'pool players are unavailable for a few more seasons because of that Coutinho clause. Anyway, I'm really not sure we need a new LW all that much with Fati here so I wouldn't spend big money on that position. Sure, Fati is not ready to be a full time starter yet but bringing back Neymar would send the wrong message to him imo. Get a versatile RW/LW/CF (Trincao could be meant for this role; I think he'll surprise a lot of people if given a fair chance) or a cheaper (veteran) player who's ready to start big games and give Fati a lot of minutes in "easier" games until he proves he's ready for more.

Rey Manaj will turn 23 on Feb.24 and considering that all our Barca - B players are 19 and 20 y.o. that signing tells me that they will use him more often with the first team. We will see.

Manaj is not good enough for the first team. Sure, he could play a few games until the end of the season because we lack in forwards department (but the same is true for Barça B now that Hiroki is also out for the season so I think he'll stay there) but if we'll get a new striker he won't play for the first team this season. He'll probably stay at Barça B for 18 months and then be sold.

but... he has collected also seven (7) yellow cards and two (2) reds. That is an alarming sign to me.

This doesn't worry me much at all. Vidal was even more wild and he has settled down since coming here.

If you ask where Griezmann will play, I will say in Segunda Division.

 

[Riordon]

The thing with Lautaro is that even though I'm a big fan of him and his profile, I think we should abandon these 100m+ transfers. They dont seem to work for us and we are the only teams in Europe who do them summer after summer. And its not like our new players perform better than those other clubs find for much less.

There must be a LW/CF out there who is on the verge of becoming worldclass who we can bring for 40-80m like when Liverpool brought Mane/Salah and so on. Right now we can get a true CF and play Griezmann as a LW or get a LW and play Griezmann as the CF. I think we will be better off with the latter. Though I can see the problem with Fati and gametime if we get a LW. But his gametime will be limited anyway if we get a CF because Griezmann will take his minutes then.

A CB, advanced midfielder and LW will be my summer then hope Emerson, Trincao, Pedri and Matheus Fernandes will be success for us.

 

[mc_lovin]

Disagree completely. Given the choice between a strikerless setup or a bad fit on the wing I would always pick the latter. Regarding galactico transfers I agree, but when a player fits I have no problem with us paying ~100ME.

The other stuff is always easy to say. I mean if we know which players are on the verge of becoming worldclass then paying 40-80ME for them is easy. But we dont. Just because Liverpool got lucky doesnt mean thats a viable strategy.

 

[Andresito]

The thing with Lautaro is that even though I'm a big fan of him and his profile, I think we should abandon these 100m+ transfers. They dont seem to work for us and we are the only teams in Europe who do them summer after summer. And its not like our new players perform better than those other clubs find for much less.

There must be a LW/CF out there who is on the verge of becoming worldclass who we can bring for 40-80m like when Liverpool brought Mane/Salah and so on.

This is the goal. Gomes was bought thinking he'd become one of those players.

Some LWs that could be the next Mané/Salah that wouldn't cost 100M:
Oyarzabal, Coman, Bailey, Jota, Everton, Carrasco and Felipe Anderson. + Bergwijn and Lozano (too late now though)

I can't say I've seen all of them consistently, but they've got a market value of around 50M, have been OK-ish for a while now while showing inconsistent glimpses of becoming world class.
I doubt anyone predicted Salah and Mané would become world class. Can't remember what status they had before moving to Liverpool.

 

[LABarcaFan]

I've said before I'm also not totally sold on spending 100m+ on Lautaro. Sure he's a very good player and I would gladly take him if we wouldn't already have Griezmann but now I'm not sure. Also, I don't see Suarez leaving this summer and he'll still start most games next season so don't know how to get all of Messi, Suarez, Lautaro and Griezmann in the lineup at the same time. The only way I would go all out on Lautaro is if Suarez will leave.

With Lautaro replacing Suarez we could also play 3-5-2 in some games (but for that to happen we would need at least two new good CBs though one of them could be Todibo). I'm not really a fan of this system but think something like this could work.

---------MATS-------
--Todibo-CB*-Lenglet--
Semedo-------------Alba
---FDJ---CM**/Arthur----
--------Messi-----------
----Lautaro---Griezmann

* fast, physical CB like Upamecano
** a good ball-wining CM who is good on the ball and can also go forward. Arthur can play when we would need more control.

Defensively Griezmann and Lautaro would both track back with Messi staying forward and offensively they are all versatile so they could interchange positions a lot.

Messi is still our RW on paper but he always moves centrally during the games so as long as he's here we won't get a balanced 4-3-3 unless we start to use him as a false 9 again.


But I would still prefer to get someone like Werner or Osimhen and save some money for a CB and a midfielder (those positions are both a priority over a new striker for me) or not bring an expensive #9 this summer at all and go all out on Haaland in 2021 when his release clause is apparently just 75m. I'm sure Bartomeu will want to bring (another) big name forward in a year before elections though so it's either Lautaro or Neymar imo. And between the two I would always choose Lautaro because he's younger, cheaper and (after what happened recently not the least important) bringing back Neymar would further increase the power of veteran players in the locker room and longterm set our required rebuild another few years back.

Forget about Mane, he and other L'pool players are unavailable for a few more seasons because of that Coutinho clause. Anyway, I'm really not sure we need a new LW all that much with Fati here so I wouldn't spend big money on that position. Sure, Fati is not ready to be a full time starter yet but bringing back Neymar would send the wrong message to him imo. Get a versatile RW/LW/CF (Trincao could be meant for this role; I think he'll surprise a lot of people if given a fair chance) or a cheaper (veteran) player who's ready to start big games and give Fati a lot of minutes in "easier" games until he proves he's ready for more.




Manaj is not good enough for the first team. Sure, he could play a few games until the end of the season because we lack in forwards department (but the same is true for Barça B now that Hiroki is also out for the season so I think he'll stay there) but if we'll get a new striker he won't play for the first team this season. He'll probably stay at Barça B for 18 months and then be sold.




This doesn't worry me much at all. Vidal was even more wild and he has settled down since coming here.

This 3 - 5 - 2 system is very popular among many European teams right now, but as you already mentioned, it will require very solid center back, someone like Virgil Van Dijk ot Stefan de Vrij. Then, you line up Semedo - F de Jong - Messi - A.Melo - J.Alba in front of them with two strikers .

I have been watching last night video clips with games of Trincao and Matheus Pereira and they seems to be good attacking midfielders/play-makers. The question is, where are they going to play in this system?

 

[FC433]

He is starting while A. Ruiz is on the bench. Stream: https://www.vipleague.cc/braga-vs-gil-vicente-streaming-link-3