Have Barcelona Become the Laughing Stock of European Football?

It wasn’t so long ago that Barcelona were being lauded as the greatest club team in the history of the game.

The zenith of Pep Guardiola's Barca came on November 29, 2010, when an inspired performance saw a then-unbeaten Real Madrid side completely torn apart by a rampant Blaugrana, who eventually ran out 5-0 winners.

Most observers were in agreement that it was the best performance at club level of all time.

Sid Lowe of the Guardian noted:

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The fifth goal had to arrive and when it did, it mattered. It turned a bano—a bath, a drubbing—into a manita, a little hand. A goal for every finger. The most perfect of beatings.

It was not just that Barcelona beat Madrid, or even that they hammered them. It was not just that they defeated Mourinho—although they loved that—and a starting XI that cost €292m.

Not that they defeated a team that had been unbeaten. It was not even that Guardiola completed a manita of his own—he has now won all five clasicos as coach, with a barely plausible aggregate score of 17-2.

It was that they did it their way.

[...] Barcelona battered Madrid. Not some team of donkeys: Madrid. Only battered is not really the word. Barcelona killed them softly, with precision not power.

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Who would've thought that just four years and a few weeks later we'd be looking at a team that is not only a shadow of the 2010/11 vintage but a club in absolute and total disarray.

A laughing stock.

David Ramos/Getty Images

Yes, FC Barcelona, that most mighty of European footballing institutions, being ridiculed by all and sundry.

The strapline that the club tend to hold great stock by nowadays—“Mes que un club” (“More than a club”)—seems something of an irrelevance at this point.

Given the most recent goings on at the club, the connotations that the Catalans are in some way the exemplar and above their peers in certain aspects is, frankly, offensive.

A downward spiral that began just as soon as the truth behind the Neymar deal was exposed, sparking the resignation of then president Sandro Rosell, has escalated immeasurably.

That Rosell preferred to fall on his own sword rather than disclose further details of the deal in the courts says much about the business dealings at the club.

David Ramos/Getty Images

An unelected sidekick taking office in Josep Maria Bartomeu was never going to work in the long term, but any self-respecting Barca fan surely wouldn't have seen the crumbling of an empire so swiftly executed.

Appalling transfer decisions by now ex-sporting director Andoni Zubizarreta were highlighted when FIFA's transfer ban on the Catalans for yet more underhand practices was upheld by the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

It brought into sharp focus just how unsuitable "Zubi" had been in the position. Douglas, Thomas Vermaelen—his charge sheet reads like a who's who of players not to purchase.

On the pitch, Barca have fared little better since Tito Vilanova's untimely and unfortunate resignation from the position.

Manu Fernandez/Associated Press

Tata Martino, to his personal credit but to Barca's complete embarrassment, said only recently to Argentinian newspaper Clarin, via Marca, when asked what he had taught Lionel Messi:

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Nothing. Nothing at all. Not to him or to Barca.

I didn't make any mark on Barcelona, it was a bubble in my career in terms of what I did as a coach.

[...] All I learned in Barcelona was about being surrounded by stars, by the best in the world. I made some monumental mistakes with Barcelona.

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Read that again. What does that tell you about the state of the club?

Luis Enrique's hiring was seen as a homecoming for one of Barca's finest exponents. After a year of Martino not really understanding what to do, here was a man who knew the Barca setup inside out. A Guardiola-lite if you prefer.

With all of the tools at his disposal to do the job properly, you have to question why it is that Enrique can't seem to get any sort of continuity or respect from his squad.

SerieAddicted provided the answer before the season had even begun:

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He never managed to inspire motivation and concentration in the team. Roma suffered many debacles in the 2011-2012 season: 3-0 from Fiorentina, 4-2 from Cagliari, 4-1 at Atalanta, 4-2 from Lecce, 4-0 from Juventus.

In each one of these games, the team showed an appalling lack of personality and let itself go, without even fighting. Lecce descended into Serie B—the Italian second division—that season but even so they outclassed Roma.

Games with Juventus are very important for Roma fans as the two clubs are divided by a harsh rivalry. But that night, Roma kneeled to the Bianconeri. Something unacceptable that definitely broke the relationship between Luis Enrique and Roma fans.

[...] The fault for such a lack of personality—and a never-ending discontinuity—has to be ascribed to the coach.

It's odd for a player that became famous also for his grit and leadership, but he clearly didn't manage to convey these characteristics over to his players.

Barcelona players need to be motivated after a negative—but not disastrous—season like the last one. Will Lucho be able to inspire them, leading Barca to a Reconquista?

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He continues to tinker with the squad; the match against Elche representing his 25th successive change. That is unheard of at this level of football.

Rumours of a dressing room spat with Lionel Messi, per Pete Jenson of the Daily Mail, leading to purported interest from Chelsea, have done nothing for Enrique's or Barca's tarnished and battered image.

The summer presidential elections called by Senor Bartomeu can't come soon enough...