Sporting Director Robert Fernandez's Impact on Barcelona Will Mark Club's Future

Barcelona legend Xavi Hernandez spoke on radio show El Larguero on Cadena Ser on Tuesday night and brought up an interesting idea Gerard Pique had mentioned.

The defender—likely in a semi-jest, semi-serious musing—suggested to the Al Sadd player that he would be the club's president in the future, while Carles Puyol would be the sporting director, Xavi would be the coach and Sergio Busquets would be the assistant.

It sounds like Blaugrana fan-fiction, but Barcelona have an impressive record at recycling players into other positions when their careers end.

Former head coach Pep Guardiola and current manager Luis Enrique both played for the club, of course, as did Barcelona legend Johan Cruyff.

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Puyol has already started to work on Pique's dream, having studied various subjects such as finance, marketing, legal aspects, technology, communication and more at Las Rozas, the Spanish Football Federation's headquarters.

He even worked as assistant to former sporting director Andoni Zubizarreta—another ex-player who took a role upstairs—for a brief period in 2014. Unfortunately, the former goalkeeper was axed in early 2015 and Puyol chose to walk soon afterwards. It is hard not to believe he will be back, though.

The man who replaced Zubizarreta was Robert Fernandez. He played for the club between 1986 and 1990, winning two Copa del Rey titles and a European Cup Winners’ Cup, and the decision was announced by director Albert Soler on July 20, 2015 in Los Angeles.

With Barcelona banned from registering any players during that summer, there was no rush to replace Zubizarreta, so the club took time to choose wisely.

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Being a sporting director at Barcelona is not an easy job—that much was shown by Zubi's dismissal. Things were turning ugly midway through Luis Enrique's debut season, with Barcelona struggling to find form. The former Camp Nou goalkeeper became the fall guy.

Some of his transfer dealings were criticised, notably Douglas and Thomas Vermaelen; the former had played only one game and the latter none thanks to injury at the time Zubi was sacked.

Between that and the FIFA sanction held over the club, Josep Maria Bartomeu decided to fire the sporting director in the aftermath of a 1-0 defeat by Real Sociedad that threatened to derail the whole season, with even Lionel Messi agitating after he started that game on the bench.

Zubizarreta's sacking felt like the president was playing to the galleries and creating a scapegoat. And so it proved, as the team recovered and went on to win the treble that year.

Some of the players Zubizarreta signed, including Marc-Andre ter Stegen, Ivan Rakitic and Luis Suarez, were instrumental in the team's success. And where was he when they lifted the treble?

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"What nobody can imagine is how lonely I was that day. Not because Barcelona sacked me, but because it was me against the greatness that represents Barca," he explained to El Periodico, h/t Sport. "After a tough year, I can say that football has brought me out of disenchantment and disappointment. Football has taken me out of the cold, solitude, the mud I was in since January 5."

Perhaps in the future that same pain will befall Fernandez, but for now, he is basking in the glory of a sensational transfer window.

It’s rare that supporters are so unanimously pleased with the work done in the market, but Fernandez nailed it across the board.

Barcelona undertook 22 operations this summer. Six signings—Lucas Digne, Samuel Umtiti, Andre Gomes, Paco Alcacer, Denis Suarez and Jasper Cillessen. Eight departing players—Dani Alves, Marc Bartra, Sandro Ramirez, Martin Montoya, Adriano, Claudio Bravo, Alen Halilovic and Alex Song. Five loans—Munir El Haddadi, Cristian Tello, Douglas, Sergi Samper and Vermaelen. And three contract renewals agreed—Busquets, Neymar and Javier Mascherano.

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For a 100 per cent approval rating the likes of Douglas, Tello and Vermaelen would have been sold rather than loaned, but regardless, Fernandez did a good job of clearing a lot of deadwood out and bringing quality, young replacements in.

The club have become fond of sales with buy-back fees. Halilovic is one, sold to SV Hamburg for €5 million, but Barcelona can bring him back for €10m. The only deal that fans aren't thrilled with is Munir being loaned to Valencia, who have an option to buy him for €12m, without a future fee set in place for Barcelona to bring him back.

That said, firstly Valencia have to stump up the €12m, and secondly if they plan to sell him on then Barcelona have an option to dive in before they do so.

Fernandez and Luis Enrique had a coherent strategy in place that spoke to the club’s two main aims in the window. Buying players who can help the club in this moment, which is more important than ever in an era where the need to win—and win right now—but also safeguard the team’s future.

With the exception of new back-up goalkeeper Jasper Cillessen, the rest of the signings are 22 or 23 years old. The perfect age to get a Barcelona football education from the greats before—and this is the great hope—they can go on to replace them.

There was some frustration when Barcelona struggled to add the "fourth" striker Luis Enrique desired behind the Messi, Luis Suarez and Neymar attacking trident, but eventually that was solved when a hard-negotiated deal for Alcacer was completed.

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Fernandez had spent some time in Brazil in the weeks before that, meeting and watching Neymar and Rafinha at the Olympics, and scouting for strikers.

Asked in an exclusive interview with Sport’s Albert Masnou and Javier Giraldo why he went to Brazil and came back empty-handed, Fernandez came back with a sensible and well-reasoned answer.

He said:

"

We saw a lot of players, but in nearly every case, they were the same cost as players in Europe, and in some cases more expensive. In the end we chose Alcacer, who already has La Liga experience. His adaption will be much quicker. I always say that there are very few South Americans that come here, to a big club, and triumph [immediately]. Nearly all of them have to pay a toll [elsewhere] first, like Rivaldo at Depor, Ronaldinho at PSG, Ronaldo at PSV and so on. The only one is Neymar and perhaps Marcelo.

There aren't players that come from South America and are a success straight away at a young age. It could have been a better bet [to sign from Brazil], but we're talking about the same money and Paco Alcacer is the reality.

"

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Wanting a young player ties into the plan of looking out for the club’s mid-term future, and it also avoids the criticism fans offered when Barcelona signed Jeremy Mathieu and Vermaelen, who were over and nearing 30, respectively, in 2014.

Fernandez made another good point in the same interview; Barcelona got excellent prices on most of their signings.

"I think we've done good deals," he said. "Umtiti in the current market would be worth a lot more. The Premier League ended up paying 40 million euros for [Shkodran] Mustafi, for example."

This summer may be looked at in the future as one of the most crucial in the club’s recent history. And if Fernandez continues to work as well as this—with a clear plan and good execution of it—Puyol will have a fine reference point for the day he eventually returns.

Rik Sharma is Bleacher Report's lead Barcelona correspondent. All information and quotes obtained firsthand unless specified. Follow him on Twitter here: @riksharma_