Here in 2011 as a goalscorer against Real Madrid - and soon probably as a coach: Xavi Hernández is about to return to his heart club
Photo:
Denis Doyle / Getty Images
Barcelona President Joan Laporta is an emotional person, but no one can say that he was guided by impulses on Thursday night.
There was, as they say, no alternative to the dismissal of coach Ronald Koeman.
Three wins from the last ten games, ninth place in the table, a precarious starting position in the Champions League and no prospect of improvement, as the 0: 1 on Wednesday evening against promoted Rayo Vallecano made clear: Barça's season threatens to derail at the end of October.
On the one hand, Laporta wasn't a fan of Koeman left by his predecessors.
He has repeatedly expressed his doubts publicly, which was anything but helpful.
Most recently, however, he had convinced himself that one of his slogans from the presidential election campaign in March should also apply to the coach question.
"We'll do it again," he had promised, alluding to his successful first term in office between 2003 and 2010, when Barça rose under him from economic ruins to become the ultimate in world football.
Taking yourself as an example is not only popular with program-conscious makers.
So Laporta declared that they wanted to hold onto Koeman - just as they did with Frank Rijkaard in 2003 after a similarly weak start to the season.
At that time they were rewarded with a furious second half of the season and in the following years with two championships and one Champions League victory.
"To resist means to win, I did it with Rijkaard too," said Laporta at the general meeting on Saturday.
The next day followed the Clásico defeat against Real Madrid, now the oath of disclosure in Vallecas.
And Laporta couldn't resist anymore.
In recent months, he has united the club behind him, moderated the departure of Lionel Messi, sensitized fans to the tight cash situation, rescheduled the most urgent part of the 1.35 billion euro debt - and on Saturday the members voted in favor received further credit for the reconstruction of the club's premises, which Barça is to renovate in the medium term.
But football still exists, and it got dreary with every game.
With Koeman's dismissal on his return journey from the Madrid district of Vallecas, the duplicate of his first term of office is now confused on another point.
Laporta's masterpiece at the time was promoting young Pep Guardiola, who had previously coached the second team for a year, as the successor to Rijkaard.
Catalans with a heart for possession
And that's exactly what he wanted to do with the man who has dominated all coaching future debates in Barcelona for over a year:
Xavi Hernández
.
As a midfielder, Xavi was a club icon like Guardiola, under whom he had his prime.
Like Guardiola, he is a Catalan, Barça through and through from childhood, and an unconditional advocate of the ball possession football that is preferred in the house.
He has been coaching the Al-Sadd club since 2019, with success and good reviews.
But stop in Qatar.
Xavi should return to Barcelona in peace, first make the second team and then take over the first with the necessary tools: that was Laporta's plan, which the president always announced in public.
But now, for the umpteenth time, during Barça's ongoing crisis, events have rolled over.
You need a coach, and after all the debacles, it has to be someone who spreads hope.
Xavi is still in Qatar - but he is ante portas.
While Sergi Barjuan, the current coach of the second team, took over as interim coach on Thursday, Xavi is said to have already given his approval, according to the newspaper »Sport«.
With Al-Sadd he therefore has an agreement that no obstacles will be put in his way when an offer from his heart club is received.
Alone the top game of the league leaders against the runner-up Al-Duhail, he should still coach, according to the condition of the Qatar.
The cracker rises on November 3rd.
The day before, Barça played for Dynamo Kiev to survive in the Champions League.
Xavi as a preacher of the soccer gospel
Even if Xavi may not start with a "do-or-die" game right away: the change will be brusque.
From Qatar straight into the fire - Guardiola had it easier then.
He was able to plan the squad for the new season and lay the foundations for his demanding football in the training camp.
Nevertheless, there was a classic false start with a defeat and a draw before the historic triumphal procession started.
Can the replication work despite the discrepancies in the script?
Xavi was a strong communicator even when he was a player.
When he talked about football, you listened.
He always vehemently defended Barça's style as the gospel of football.
The team in which he played himself, and possibly Guardiola's Manchester City: These are also the references of coach Xavi.
"I'm obsessed with possession," he says in an article for "Coaches Voice".
"The most beautiful and valuable thing in football is to have the ball, to dominate and attack the game with it."
Even as an active player, he feared the moments when his team didn't have the ball.
"And now as a coach I suffer even more."
The question is whether Barça's squad has the quality to implement Xavi's ideas quickly and against strong competition.
Under the pragmatist Koeman, the team didn't exactly give the impression of tactical refinement.
On the other hand, around half of the current squad have been trained in their own club or have joined them young enough to have internalized Barça's holy three P's (presses, positional play, ball possession - Spanish: posesión).
The range goes from Xavi's former teammates Gerard Piqué, Sergio Busquets, Jordi Alba and Sergi Roberto to the young national players Ansu Fati, Pedri and Gavi, other debutants of this season such as Álex Baldé or Nico González and Riqui Puig, who was neglected by Koeman, to the annoyance of Laporta.
Xavi could field a whole team of his own, and one should not rule out the possibility that he will do that, like Guardiola's former assistant Tito Vilanova in the 2012/2013 season.
So the right trainer at the right moment?
At the beginning of 2020, Xavi rejected an offer from Barcelona.
“I had only been a coach for a few months then,” he said last week.
"Now I feel ready to train any team in the world."
Rivaldo, another club legend, has little doubt: "I would be very happy if Xavi had the opportunity to become the new coach of FC Barcelona," he wrote on Instagram.
"I have great confidence that he will pull the club out of this situation."
There was a like from Xavi on Thursday evening.