Barcelona are careening towards a vortex of hell and there seems to be no signs of stopping

Games like the quarter-final that took place on August 15th 2020 are games that will forever be remembered. It’s like that infamous Germany win over Brazil, like that infamous two-legged Barcelona vs PSG game, like that AS Roma come-back against Barcelona and so many others. But the crux of the other games, barring that World Cup clash, was the fact that they were two-legged games. This happened over one leg and yet even then, it could be so much worse for Barcelona.

But in the six odd years since, Barcelona have spent well over nearly a billion euros on 29 players and yet, they haven’t solved their greatest problem. The fact that Lionel Messi is 33 and the Argentine’s influence is waning. You see, this is Barcelona’s biggest problem and the biggest one the club will ever face especially in a footballing world such as this. Because, for those who live under a rock, Lionel Andres Messi is by far Barcelona’s greatest ever player.

Think about it as you flip through Barcelona’s squad lists over the last few decades and one thing becomes painfully obvious, without a bonafide star, Barcelona have struggled to win. Before Messi, it was Ronaldinho before him it was Rivaldo and Figo before that it was Ronaldo Nazario before that it was Johan Cryuff’s super team. Move back even further and you had Gary Lineker (a great in his time), Bernd Schuster before him, Diego Armando Maradona and Johan Cryuff before that and Luis Suarez and Laszlo Kubala before that.

There is the Neymar conundrum but it’s been three years since he left. In those three years, the club (according to Transfermarkt) has spent €789 million on players. Four of them sat on the bench, with two of them record signings, as Barcelona walked into the break 4-1 down against Bayern Munich with their most expensive buy sitting on Bayern’s bench. Three started the game with one in England, one in China, one in Russia, one refusing to play and a few didn’t even make the starting 23.

It practically screams abhorrent recruitment and that has seen them spiral out of control and towards a chaotic depth that only AC Milan can understand. And as fans of the Rossoneri will tell you, it’s hard to dig yourself out of that hole because ignoring that meteorite racing to destroy you is exactly what collapses the right dominos that leads to a historic loss. Yet the even bigger problem that Barcelona face is the outcome of trying to overcome something as massive as what the loss of Lionel Messi does to a club.

They will always be “the” European club and have enough money to spend on new additions but the playing field has now been levelled. The Premier League’s incredible broadcasting deal combined with the growth of clubs across Europe’s big five leagues has reduced the lure of the Camp Nou. So much so that any player Barcelona can get so can Juventus (as Matthijs de Ligt proved), so can Real Madrid, so can Paris Saint-Germain and the list is there for the world to see.

Since end of the 2014 window, by my calculations, Barça have signed 29 players for almost a billion euros.

How many have been an unqualified success? Not one?

— Sid Lowe (@sidlowe) August 14, 2020

It simply makes the club’s job even harder but for now, it looks like they’ve got some kind of idea. Build a semblance of a team for Messi’s final years and then deal with the aftermath. It’s what Juventus are doing in Turin as they chase after that elusive Champions League crown but the Old Lady’s financial dealings over the years have helped their cause. Barcelona, on the other hand, doesn’t have the same luxury because they are in serious debt and have a myriad of issues including at the board-room level to deal with.

But even then the reality is crystal clear, because Barcelona have failed at that and now the time has come to break up this team. Not everyone needs to be sold because both Gerard Pique and Sergio Busquets have done enough to deserve a fitting farewell. And the likes of Marc-Andre Ter Stegen, Frenkie de Jong, Ansu Fati and even Antoine Griezmann are building blocks for the future alongside the few gems at La Masia. There are a few others but the point is that Barcelona needs to break up the band.

But with Lionel Messi at the core and in his final years, this could be their chance to build another super-team with a wise and wily veteran at the heart of it all or else face the consequences of becoming yet another giant who lives in the past. And for a club like Barcelona to do that would be beyond easy thanks to the aptly titled "Barcelona Licensing and Merchandising" which has merchandised and monetized the past and by doing that they earned a sensational, and the most in Europe, €840 million last season.

46% of that is all commercial income with broadcast accumulating for 35% and the rest all matchday but it's that commercial bit that will continue to rise. And there's nothing wrong with that, not one bit. But for a club that claims to be amongst Europe's best and have that incredible need to win everything, every single season watching their footballing empire crumble has to hurt or at the very least sting.