Barcelona football club fired Quique Setien tonight, following a catastrophic loss the Spanish club experienced in the Champions League quarterfinals against Bayern.
Setien’s Terrible Stint
“The board of directors has decided that Quique Setién will no longer be coach of the first team,” – the first and the most important sentence in Barcelona’s latest statement.
What was expected for a long time, was finalized following a horrifying loss against Bayern. After just 25 games, Setien leaves Camp Nou humiliated and labeled as one of the most devastating experiments in the history of the Catalonian team.
During that time, he managed to lose the title even though having a slight edge over Real Madrid, to record the worst ever defeat in the European competitions and to ruin the already cracked chemistry surrounding the locker room.
From this point of view, Barca’s decision to fire Ernest Valverde this winter turned out to be a bust, even though he himself didn’t have shiny results. The system he imposed had many flaws, but under Setien, there was no system according to the players.
We often witnessed open disputes between the players and the coach, sometimes in the media comments following the matches.
Setien’s terrible tactics and gameplans, especially after the restart of the play were the main reasons why Barcelona failed to win crucial matches in the title race, allowing Real Madrid to jump over them in the standings.
In the moments when it became obvious that the Los Blancos secured the title, the situation and the atmosphere in the club indicated that Setien might leave immediately. However, the management decided to allow him to finish the Champions League campaign. As said before, it was a poor choice.
The loss against the Bavarians will stay written forever, and it might have further implications on the team’s future.
Messi Factor
It appears that Lionel Messi might leave Camp Nou. Many predict Inter Milan as his next destination, because of his recent house purchase. Furthermore, it is located near Inter’s facilities.
For quite some time, there were various speculations about Messi’s future. The Argentinian has been pretty disappointed with the way things developed inside the club, and he blames the board for all the bad things that happened. Among other things, he believes that there is no proper support for him on the pitch.
Who is Next?
According to the latest intel, Barca’s Dutch legend, and the current national team head coach, Ronald Koeman should fill in the gap created with Setien’s departure.
He was the assistant coach in the club from 1998 until 2000, and already has a solid resume. He would start with Vitesse, then move to Ajax, Benfica, PSV, Valencia, AZ Alkmaar, Feyenoord, Southampton, and Everton before becoming the leader of the Netherlands’ national squad.
Though the deal is still not confirmed, and if anything goes wrong, two more names are in the combination, Mauricio Pochettino, and Barca’s legendary midfielder, Xavi.
Everything should be resolved in the next two or three days, if not sooner.
