Former Barcelona right-back Dani Alves has offered his thoughts on what is wrong with his former team. The 37-year-old who left Barcelona for Italian giants Juventus in 2016 after almost a decade in Catalonia is of the opinion that the current Blaugrana lacks identity on the pitch.
“What this Barça lacks is the identity it has always had, like Ronaldinho’s Barça, our Barça. The identity of a team that dominates for 90 minutes, 100 minutes, or 150 minutes. Barça are there for people to enjoy. Now what I see, from the outside, is that Barça are just another team. They used to have an understanding throughout the team and made things look easy.” He told Catalunya Radio
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“What this Barça lacks is the identity it has always had, like Ronaldinho’s Barça, our Barça. The identity of a team that dominates for 90 minutes, 100 minutes, or 150 minutes. Barça are there for people to enjoy. Now what I see, from the outside, is that Barça are just another team. They used to have an understanding throughout the team and made things look easy.” He told Catalunya Radio
Speaking on his ex teammate, Lionel Messi’s frustration at the club, the Brazilian chipped in.
“Leo is a natural winner. He doesn’t like losing. When the team loses it’s normal he gets angry, he always wants to win. Just like me. We always want to win.
“He sees, what I feel, and that’s a lack of support. I’ll always say that Messi is the main course and we were the perfect ingredients for that plate. Now I have the feeling that he’s doing everything, all the time, and we must remember he’s only human.”
Barca were beaten 2-1 at home by Osasuna on Thursday, handing the LaLiga title to their rival, Real Madrid. An emotional Lionel Messi spoke of the need for the club to change to continue the Champions League race.
“We need to change a lot, otherwise we will also lose against Napoli, I already said before that playing like this we won’t be able to fight for the Champions League and you see, we could not even fight for the league. We need to be self-critical.”