
Barcelona president Joan Laporta and his sporting director, Mateu Alemany, apparently saw it fit not to caution restraint and did not hold back when discussing what has gone wrong with Los Culés in the past few weeks.
Undoubtedly interesting times lay ahead when it comes to Barcelona’s future, especially after a recent event where Laporta and members of his executive team were decidedly adamant on how thing the first team should shape up.
Barcelona’s newly-reinstated president had met with the team’s staff, where he unveiled those who will be in charge of the different departments. There, Laporta and his sporting director, Alemany, shared an honest albeit controversial assessment on the first team’s recent lackadaisical performances which were too obvious to go unnoticed.
According to reports by Catalunya Radio, the president’s words about the first team were not aimed to flatter, hinting, or more like warning, instead that a massive overhaul would take place at Camp Nou this summer. In other words – a purge.
“This is the end of an era. We desperately need to increase the level of our first team, and while at it, we should adequate the squad’s wages to the moment we’re living,” Laporta stated.
His curt words were followed by a short speech by Alemany, who took the cue from his president and dispensed with the pleasantries and left no stone unturned when he spoke about the team’s lackluster form leading up the end of the season.
“Things have been done properly in our offices and not on the pitch. Every team has been close to winning titles or won them except one: the first team. That’s something that can’t happen again, and we will work on it,” Alemany added.
Ominously heavy words indeed, nothing short of the cold, perfunctory pronouncement of a judgment with the gavel coming down hard on the judge’s desk.
Laporta and Mateu will both be pitching in once again in a serious attempt to reconstruct Barcelona, like they had done with appreciable success in earlier years in 2003 and 2008, and both of those eras ended with the club winning UEFA Champions League titles.
Noticeably, those rebuilding processes started with a drastic change in the managerial role, and Ronald Koeman could be consigned to the gallows in the next few days.
Most interesting would be to see the reaction Laporta and Mateu’s incriminating words produce among the Camp Nou’s first XI members.
Surely they would not be expected to just calmly take the insults and slap in their faces sitting down.