5 Star Players Barcelona Wish They Had Not Sold
Barcelona have certainly seen some footballing royalty pass through the Camp Nou's revolving doors over the years.
Some of the best players to have ever played the game have done so while wearing the classic Blaugrana shirt of this mighty Catalan club.
Many have become legends at the club, although there have been a few that either went on to make their names elsewhere or were sold for any number of other reasons.
Let's look at five stars that Barcelona wish they hadn't sold.
Thiago Alcantara
1 of 5
Thiago Alcantara might be a slightly controversial choice for this list, but there's little doubt he was always destined for stardom. That much was obvious when he was at Barca.
The club could've done a lot more to keep the player happy and not see him eventually sold to Bayern Munich, where he has become one of the first names on Pep Guardiola's teamsheet.
Readers should remind themselves of the outcry at his sale in order to recall just how highly coveted he was in Catalonia.
Yaya Toure
2 of 5
Yaya Toure has gone on to become a household name at Manchester City, scoring some of their most important goals on the way to putting the Citizens on the world footballing map.
His driving runs, powerful shots and robust presence in the centre of midfield have all been shown off to their fullest effect.
Toure was sold because of the emergence of Sergio Busquets at Barca. No one can possibly deny the impact the latter has made, but his skill set is at the opposite end of the scale to Toure's.
Barca do have a presence in midfield yes, but it is nothing like that Toure provided. A man-mountain of a player who took all before him in his pomp.
Ronaldo
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The impact Ronaldo made at Barcelona in the 1996/97 season is almost beyond compare.
The youngster was frighteningly good, and his 47 goals in 51 appearances, per the club's official website, was unheard of at the time.
The 20-year-old raised the Pichichi bar in the space of a solitary season at Barca, and only the emergence of Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi saw his mark surpassed.
There simply wasn't a defender who could live with him.
An intoxicating mix of raw power, electrifying pace and goals galore, Barca will probably always rue the fact he stayed for just one campaign because of problems with the directors and his agents—and that he ultimately became a Real Madrid legend.
Michael Laudrup
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Michael Laudrup was another player who ended up in the white of Real Madrid after his alleged falling out with then-Barca manager Johan Cruyff, which he later denied to BBC Sport.
The Dane was an integral part of Cruyff's Dream Team, and it was a bitter blow when he left, especially given that he had helped the team to four Primera Liga titles in a row.
The year his Barca career ended, 1994, was a World Cup year, and Laudrup joined Los Blancos after the tournament.
Real became a much better team with Laudrup pulling the strings, as he had done with their great rivals, and his fifth consecutive league title keeps him in the record books as the only player to have achieved the feat.
Ronaldinho
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Ronaldinho was the game-changer—the player who took Barcelona to a different level entirely.
When president Joan Laporta took office, he promised to bring David Beckham with him. As it happened, Beckham didn't arrive, but the Brazilian did. And what a move it turned out to be.
The mastery Ronaldinho had over the ball, and the skill with which he played, was like nothing seen before at Camp Nou.
Genuine open-mouthed amazement was commonplace.
Unfortunately, nightclubs and parties eventually appeared to mean more to him than footballing greatness, and Barca were well within their rights to dispense with the services of the Brazilian genius in 2008.
It was a sad end.
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