We Love Barcelona

Top Spanish outlet Barcelona have been named as the second best employers in football going by wages they pay to their players.

Despite struggling with form in the recent years, United sit atop the highest paying clubs in the world. According to the survey, the average United first team player earns in the region of £110,000 per week. This ends in £5.77 million in annual payment to a first team Red Devils star.

The current La Liga champions are second on the list. The average first team player earns £5.65 million, while Manchester City pays an average player £5.40 million.

The amount splashed on Paul Pogba and Zlatan Ibrahimovic ensured United leapfrogged to first position compared to their standings on the list last year. In addition, following the fall of the Pound following Brexit, American sports sides rank higher than most elite English clubs. However, Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool managed to make the top 60.

Overall, the as it offers players the highest average weekly wage at £48,766. With the increase in revenue from television deals, that figure is expected to climb next year bar any major change. German champions Bayern Munich top the survey results in Germany while Serie A champions Juventus top Italy’s. China is a major force with clubs offering some of the most lucrative deals to players.

Real Madrid’s Cristiano Ronaldo remains the highest paid football player with his £365,000 weekly wage. Considering all sports, Basketball top with NBA’s Cleveland Cavaliers paying out £6.9 million to an average player, then Baseball’s New York Yankees and Basketball’s LA Clippers make the top three ahead of United who are in fourth place.

Yerry Mina is not such a well-known free-agent player in comparison to others that are out there available to be signed but it seems like he has gathered enough attention for Barcelona as it’s believed that they have already pre-signed the 22 years old Colombian who is currently performing for Palmeiras.

Jair Mina said: “Yes, a pre-agreement was signed and there’s the possibility that the kid goes to Barcelona. It’s only a pre-agreement, so there’s still the chance that other teams make an offer, so a move to Barca would depend on circumstances and the desire of the player and if other top European teams are interested.”

Gerard Pique is 29 years old while Javier Mascherano is 32 and it’s believed that Barcelona has initiated scouting young talents that can succeed these veteran defenders and follow their legacy after they decide to hang up their boots.

Another player that has been rumored to be in the radar of Barcelona besides Yerry Mina is Mauricio Lemos. Lemos is a 20 year old centre-back who is performing for Las Palmas and has been making impressive performances with the Spanish club.

Barcelona has actually already launched an offer for him of around €12 million bid but it was rejected but they might launch an upgraded bid for the young Uruguayan defender that has been impressing the head chiefs of Las Palmas so much that the club decided to convert his initial loan deal from Rubin Kazan into a 5 year long permanent contract.

Manchester United legend Peter Schmeichel has rubbished the legacies of former Barcelona coach Pep Guardiola.

Guardiola built an enviable reputation in world football with his successes at Camp Nou where he recorded unprecedented victory in a four-year period. He supervised the lifting of three La Liga titles, two Copa del Rey cups and the team was crowned Champions in Europe twice. The achievements made him one of the most decorated managers in modern football, and he keeps receiving acclaim for his efforts with the Blaugrana team.

Guardiola resigned from Barca, and after a hiatus took up an offer with German champions – Bayern Munich. He recorded relative success in Germany, though there were stagnations in Europe. He lifted three successive German Bundesliga titles, two DFB-Pokal cups, and semi final endings in the Champions League.

Ahead of the Manchester Derby, Schmeichel revealed his position on the accomplishments of Guardiola. “What he did with Barcelona was fantastic. He was very lucky he had the players at Barcelona, but he was clever in what he did,” Schmeichel started out, talking to OmniSport correspondents.

“The Premier League is a completely different animal to ay other in the world. It just goes on and on and on, you feel it never stops, even in March you have 12 games to go, you think will this ever stop?”

Schmeichel then took a swipe at Guardiola’s time in Germany, saying: “He was okay at Bayern Munich. I have to say he was okay. For me, personally, he changed a really good entertaining team to become more boring to watch.” Schmeichel added that Guardiola’s priority was to keep possession, while for most managers; it was scoring goals to win games. The Manchester derby is set for Saturday.

Barcelona started their defence of the league title with an extremely comfortable 6-2 win over Real Betis at the Camp Nou.

Barcelona were overall favourites going into the game, but few would have imagined such an impressive score on the opening day. Suarez and Lionel Messi were at their imperious best in the game and they later received praise from manager Luis Enrique for their performances. This was also the 100th win for Enrique as the manager of Barcelona. After having been hugely successful in the last few years, one of the biggest task for Enrique was to maintain the motivation within the squad.

He seems to have achieved exactly this purpose, as the Spaniard felt that Barcelona could not have had more motivation for a win. The victory sets Barcelona on a strong part but they will be interrupted by the international break coming soon. Once the season resumes, the club will go up against the likes of Atletico Madrid, Deportivo Alavés, and Leganés in the month of September. One of the positive aspects for Enrique against Real Betis was the return to form for Lionel Messi. The Argentine superstar scored a brace, but he was overshadowed by Luis Suarez’ coming up with a hat-trick.

Last season’s top goal scorer Suarez is favourite to win the Golden Boot award once again. “The players were very motivated, and very active both in attack and defence. We were brave and very effective. A complete game. Sergi Roberto, down the same flank as always, very attentive in the defensive aspect of his game, and showed good anticipation. In attack, he was very good, looking for space and creating chances. Arda has a lot of quality and can perform in the two positions, both as an inside midfielder and as a forward,” said Enrique.

Barcelona suffered a shock thrashing at the hands of Liverpool in a pre-season friendly game and manager Luis Enrique admitted that it clearly was not the team’s best day.

A 4-0 result in the International Champions Cup is unlikely to create a lot of uncertainty surrounding the Spanish giants ahead of the new season. They are still expected to be favourites for the league title that they won in style last season. However, Enrique will be hoping to perform much better in the Champions League where they will face opponents even stronger than Liverpool.

One of the reasons for the defeat could be that Liverpool are in a much better physical status after having begun pre-season earlier. The English league starts a few weeks ahead of the Spanish league. Even then, such a massive score would not be expected when Barcelona step onto the pitch.Enrique will be looking to improve the defence before they begin their title defence. Before the start of the title defence, Barcelona take on Sevilla in the Spanish Super Cup on August 14. The club also take onSampdoria in the Trofeo Joan Gamper as a final preparation. Individual errors were a major factor in Barcelona conceding four goals, butEnrique chose to look at the positives instead.

“It definitely wasn’t our best day. We made a number of errors. After the first goal we had chances, but then we let in two quick goals and that was the match.But as a spectacle, for the fans and the stadium, we have to look at the positive side of things.It was nice to see the affection the Liverpool have for Luis [Suarez], and it was a shame he couldn’t score,” said the manager.“It is clear that today we needed some more players back, to reach the level that Liverpool were playing at,” said midfielder Ivan Rakitic.

Manchester City confirmed that it has defeated Spanish giant Barcelona in the race to sign Benjamin Garre, the grandson of Oscar Garre who won the World Cup back in 1986.

Pep Guardiola is excited to sign the very talented player who has been making waves. The Spanish tactician signed the rising youngster from Velez Sarsfield, according to reports from Goal.

Barcelona was really keen on landing the player especially as Garre is considered one of the best players of his generation in Argentina. His father Oscar Garre is a former defender who was part of the national team of Argentina when they lifted the 1986 World Cup. Since the player was not under contract, Man City would pay only minimal compensation. The young player, who has spent time in England with Manchester United, excitedly said: “I was taken to see the club and train. Velez, as always, respected me and gave me the opportunity to travel. But I could not say if I will one day join [United] because this is something that my family is in charge of.”

Barcelona have also lost out on signing some other players this summer. One of their defenders Dani Alves left to join Italian champions Juventus recently. Alves will be plying his trade in Turin in the coming campaign but his leave wasn’t celebrated as much, especially as he was a legend.

He had his last contract extended by a year in the last minute and when he left he claimed he did because playing in La Liga for the Catalan club was too easy.

Juventus wanted to do a double swoop of Alves and Javier Mascherano but have decided to abandon the idea of landing Mascherano this summer. Juve director Guiseppe Marotta told La Gazzetta dello Sport that the Catalan giant were even not likely to sell Mascherano after the manager Luis Enrique assured him of his place in the team, despite having two years left. Marotta said he was happy with the two players he got. He said: “We have made two important signings with Miralem Pjanic and Dani Alves as we worked on the market and started building the team for next season.

Even though he came through the ranks at Espanyol, Marc Bartra was completely accepted as one of their own by Barcelona supporters.

This was one of the few occasions in which this event has happened. It was highly anticipated that Bartra would go on to become one of the finest in the Barcelona ranks. However, he has surprised many by completing a move to Borussia Dortmund at the end of the 2015-16 season.Bartra has just brought an end to 6 years at the Camp Nou as a first-team player.

Recalling back at the reasons for his exit,Bartra says that he will not talk anything bad about manager Luis Enrique. Since his return to the club as a manager, Enrique has won a lot of plaudits and many even feel that the team are playing better than the Guardiola days. They have certainly been as successful – if not better – than Guardiola’s team, while not getting the same amount of headlines. Bartra has seen the manager successfully take the pressure away from the likes of Lionel Messi, who has been the main focus over the last decade. Instead, he has been able to get players like Neymar and the Luis Suarez performing on an even better level.

Bartra says that the move to Dortmund came quickly and there was no looking back.“It was all really quick. As soon as we received the offer, we valued it as a really good one, and it filled me with excitement. It’s an important challenge for me. It was a big step, but seeing how last season was, I imagined it would happen. I think this option arrived at a really good time, in which I have gone through everything. I’ve had good years at Barça, and tough years, but in general they’re moments which have made me mature,” said Bartra.

Luis Enrique was extremely happy with the way Barcelona returned to their ruthless effectiveness in the 8-0 win over Deportivo la Coruna.

The game was always expected to be an easy one for the Catalan club. However, cause for concern was raised a few days ago after the club suffered a shock loss against Valencia. This was the third consecutive defeat for Barcelona and this phenomenon has not taken place for more than a decade. Suddenly, Barcelona looked like a shadow of the team that went on an unbeaten run of 39 games before it was finally broken by Real Madrid winning at the Camp Nou.

The team has been looking tired and devoid of ideas. Manager Enrique has been criticised for having a thin squad when he was aware of the club being involved in competitions like the Club World Cup aside from a whole host of domestic and European commitments. Barcelona have been fielding the same starting line-up for a number of matches. Goalscoring was a major factor in the success, but the forward line up of Messi, Suarez, and Neymar have not been functioning well in recent weeks. They provided the best answer possible after thrashing Deportivo la Coruna.

Suarez came up with four goals on his own, while Messi, Neymar, Ivan Rakitic, and Bartra were also on the scoresheet.”The game was very similar to Valencia (a 2-1 home defeat). We did a great job today and I don’t know if we had more or less chances, but of course we were incredibly effective, that was the fundamental difference.This time we had infinite solutions and we moved the ball around midfield really well, but I insist that we did the same against Valencia and look at the result.In this job you have to be prepared for everything to happen and always be aware,” said Enrique.

Fortunately for the supporters of Birmingham City, Gary Rowett announced his desire to stay with the Football League Championship club on a long term basis and this is excellent news for everyone who wants to see the English outfit excel with positive results.

When Gary Rowett took control of Birmingham City on October 27 of 2015 and he has guided the club from the bottom of the League Championship to the top spots of the league and are in a comfortable position of snatching a playoff position with a possibility of getting promoted to the Premier League.

So far, it’s been a very impressive campaign for Rowett in St.Andrew’s. who has gained the support and trust of the fanatics of Birmingham City. There were rumors going around claiming that Gary Rowett was going to join a number of different clubs some of these were: Fulham and Queens Park Rangers but all of these rumors were shut down when the director of Birmingham City confirmed it as Panos Pavlakis said: “Fans can rest assured that everyone at the club is together as one, striving for further improvement and success with Gary at the helm as manager.”

When this announcement was officially made to the public, fans of the club voiced their happiness through social media as they said that this was a huge relief and Gary Rowett truly deserves to have his contract extended. Making a club go from the bottom spots of a league into the higher section and have a chance of competing in the Premier League and this was accomplished in a relatively short period of time.

Even if Birmingham City does not manage to make that final push and enter as well as stay in the highly coveted play off zone, Gary Rowett has earned his stay with the club.

It has been confirmed by the president of Barcelona, Josep Maria Bartomeu that Luis Enrique is interested and attempting to sign another attacking powerhouse to the team and this new player might be signed within the upcoming few weeks when the winter transfer window opens.

Barcelona was fined by FIFA and not allowed to make any transfers for an entire year due to inconsistencies that were found in some of their previous signings but this sanction will be reaching it’s end in January of 2016 and the Spanish club will be able to add new players.

Despite the FIFA ban that was issued to Barcelona, they still managed to secure the services of ArdaTuran and Aleis Vidal but none of them have been actually able to play in any competitive game for the team of Luis Enrique, they will be able to finally get some playing time starting from January.
Even with the addition of these players, Luis Enrique is still interested in signing a few more performers that can improve his squad even further; this was recently announced by Barcelona’s Josep Maria Bartomeu.

The president of the Spanish club voiced the plans of Luis Enrique as he said: “The coach and the technical staff want a striker. If he comes it will be a loan deal with a right to buy. We’ll also have ArdaTuran and Vidal coming in, who are two great players.”

It comes as a surprise to know that Luis Enrique and the rest of the technical staff are interested to sign yet another offensive player, taking into consideration that Barcelona 36 goals in 15 matches which is the 2nd highest amount of the entire La Liga followed behind only by Real Madrid.

It’s likely that this new attacker will be used as a backup option more than anything else as the offensive duties of Barcelona are already being carried on by Lionel Messi, Luis Suarez and Neymar.