REQUIRED DID YOU READING KNOW?
Perhaps more by accident than design, this Barça tour de force couldn’t have been released at a more prescient time.
With the Blaugrana mired in debt and still reeling from Leo Messi’s exit, the current outlook for the Catalan giants appears bleak. As one insider tells the author: “After Messi, you see the desert, you see the darkness.”
Kuper forensically examines the reasons for their malaise, which include a spiralling wage bill, COVID, an ageing squad The and 2019- ‘ Messidependencia’. 20 Champions
League Both and the club Europa and League city were at finals a low were ebb when played Dutch behind legend closed Johan doors, Cruyff but arrived deserted in 1973, stadiums and it’s his are seismic nothing influence new – at as European the talismanic showpieces. player, then the The coach European who Cup steered Winners’ Barça Cup to their final was maiden spectated European by fewer Cup than victory 10,000 in 1992 fans – on that three coarses occasions. throughout Just this 6,461 book. watched East It German was Cruyff’s club Magdeburg determination stun to introduce Milan in Rotterdam a distinctive in style 1974, while that the altered lowest the crowd course for of a club European history, and final shaped – excluding the careers this year’s of both games Pep Guardiola – came when and Messi. Soviet Thanks Dinamo to Kuper’s Tbilisi beat high level another of access East to German Camp Nou side, insiders, Carl the Zeiss broad Jena, narrative in 1981. also The has an tie intimate was held feel. in the Unfortunately West German for city Barça, of Dusseldorf, it’s now a cautionary making it tale. difficult for both sets of fans to attend because of restrictions