{"id":185,"date":"2022-03-09T13:52:16","date_gmt":"2022-03-09T13:52:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.365scores.com\/news\/?p=185"},"modified":"2022-04-03T17:57:15","modified_gmt":"2022-04-03T17:57:15","slug":"barcelona-desperate-for-europa-glory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.365scores.com\/news\/barcelona-desperate-for-europa-glory","title":{"rendered":"Barcelona Desperate For Europa Glory"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>FC Barcelona playing in the UEFA Europa League is an extremely strange sight, but La Blaugrana must go all out to capture glory in Europe\u2019s secondary club competition. Since the appointment of Xavi as manager in November, Barca have looked almost unrecognisable from Ronald Koeman&#8217;s side in the opening months of the season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Club legend Xavi was announced as the new manager to guide his former club back to winning ways, and their resurgence under the 42-year-old has been sensational. Since Xavi made a return to the Camp Nou, Barcelona have gradually started to look like their former selves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"934\" src=\"https:\/\/www.365scores.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/Barca-1024x934.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-186\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Bar\u00e7a were 9th in La Liga when Koeman was shown the door in October, and qualification for the Champions League knockouts was already looking unlikely for the four-time UCL winners. Bar\u00e7a currently occupy third place in La Liga, however it is all but improbable for them to mount a late title challenge on El Cl\u00e1sico rivals Real Madrid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Bar\u00e7a are the current holders of the Copa del Rey, but were knocked by Athletic Bilbao \u2013 whom they beat in the Final last year \u2013 in the Round of 16 this season. This means that their only realistic chance of celebrating silverware at the end of this season comes with triumphing in the Europa League. After finishing behind Bayern Munich and Benfica in Group E of the Champions League, Barcelona were demoted to the Europa League Round of 16 playoffs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Bar\u00e7a overcame Napoli in the Round of 16 playoffs, <em>5-3<\/em> on aggregate, and next take on Turkish outfit Galatasaray in the Round of 16. The Catalans welcome Gala to the Camp Nou on Thursday evening, before traveling to Istanbul for the return leg seven days later. The Europa League Final takes place on 18 May at the Estadio Ram\u00f3n S\u00e1nchez-Pizju\u00e1n in the Spanish city of Seville.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.365scores.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/Europa-992x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-187\" width=\"496\" height=\"512\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Bar\u00e7a are desperate for trophy success not only for footballing purposes, but also to rake in as much revenue as they possibly can. Following several years of mismanagement by the club&#8217;s hierarchy, particularly under the jurisdiction of former President Josep Maria Bartomeu, Barcelona have found themselves plagued by an existential financial crisis. Bartomeu left his role in October 2020 and was replaced by the current incumbent Joan Laporta, who previously served as the club&#8217;s President from 2003-2010. Last year Laporta revealed Bar\u00e7a was over \u20ac1bn in debt, citing poor financial decisions made under his predecessor&#8217;s presidency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Bar\u00e7a were dealt another hammer blow last summer as they lost their greatest ever player. Lionel Messi left the Catalan club after La Liga financial regulations did not allow for the Argentine to renew his contract at a cash-strapped Bar\u00e7a. After selling Neymar for an eye-watering \u20ac220m fee in 2017, Bar\u00e7a then forked out a combined fee upwards of \u20ac270m to acquire Ousmane Demb\u00e9l\u00e9 and Philippe Coutinho in the same summer. Two years later they splashed out a further \u20ac120m on signing Antoine Griezmann from Atl\u00e9tico Madrid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>After they were restricted to mainly free transfers last summer, the financially ailing Bar\u00e7a had a considerably emphatic January transfer window in which several key players were brought in. Dani Alves returned to the club on a free transfer, nearly six years after departing Catalonia. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang also joined on a free, and Adama Traor\u00e9 \u2013 a former La Masia graduate \u2013 returned to the club on an initial loan deal from Premier League side Wolves. Spanish forward Ferran Torres joined from Manchester City for a \u20ac55m fee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Xavi and his men will be hoping that their new additions can steer the club to success in the Europa League, and to also cement their spot in the top four of La Liga.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<script>(function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(d.getElementById(id))return;js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src='https:\/\/embed.ex.co\/sdk.js';fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}(document,'script','exco-sdk'));<\/script><div class=\"exco\" data-id=\"8271f1bb-d552-4124-a4d5-3714c31dd34f\" data-show-share=\"false\" data-show-info=\"false\"><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>FC Barcelona playing in the UEFA Europa League is an extremely strange sight, but La Blaugrana must go all out to capture glory in Europe\u2019s secondary club competition. Since the appointment of Xavi as manager in November, Barca have looked almost unrecognisable from Ronald Koeman&#8217;s side in the opening months of the season. Club legend &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":188,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[146,147],"class_list":["post-185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-soccer","tag-fc-barcelona","tag-uefa-europa-league"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.365scores.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.365scores.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.365scores.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.365scores.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.365scores.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=185"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.365scores.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.365scores.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/188"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.365scores.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.365scores.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.365scores.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}