Doubts remain over Luis Enrique's pedigree as ex Barca boss must give Spain new identity

Andy West 16:01 09/07/2018
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  • After winning a league, cup and Champions League treble in his first season at Barcelona, and then adding the double 12 months later, you might think that Luis Enrique’s services would be in hot demand.

    Strangely, though, that has never been the case and there will be a sense of underwhelming apathy after the former forward was confirmed as Spain’s new manager on a two-year contract.

    It will be an intriguing appointment, both for Spain and for Luis Enrique himself.

    The national team, of course, is in the midst of a crisis after losing previous boss Julen Lopetegui to Real Madrid on the eve of the World Cup and then suffering a poor tournament in Russia, being assailed by a mountain of criticism after the penalty shoot-out defeat to the hosts.

    The flat and flaccid manner of that performance has led to calls – both within Spain and internationally – for the team’s famous ‘tiki-taka’ possession-based passing game to be abandoned in favour of a more contemporary fast-paced style.

    Spanish football isn’t only appointing a new national team manager, but also addressing an identity crisis which is threatening to undermine and unravel everything La Roja has stood for over the course of the last decade.

    For Luis Enrique, this is nothing new. He arrived at Barcelona in the summer of 2014, in the wake of a desperately disappointing trophyless season under hapless Argentina coach Tata Martino, who oversaw the dying embers of Pep Guardiola’s classic team with seemingly little idea about how things could be taken forward.

    And for the first few months of his Camp Nou reign, Enrique also struggled desperately with that challenge, not helped by the fact that his club’s big summer signing, Luis Suarez, missed the first three months of the season through suspension after biting Italy’s Giorgio Chiellini during the World Cup.

    When Enrique finally got all his pieces together, he oversaw something approaching a revolution: Lionel Messi was removed from his false nine position and repositioned on the right wing; Xavi Hernandez was eased out of the team and replaced by Ivan Rakitic, and long balls from the back attempted to get the ball to Messi, Suarez and Neymar as quickly as possible, often bypassing the previous engine room of the midfield.

    Tiki-taka was dead, but Barcelona were revitalised and – inspired by the matchless magnificence of the forward three – embarked upon a sensational six-month run of form to win every honour going in exhilarating fashion.

    Throughout that glorious period, however, there was an unusual level of suspicion about the manager: did Luis Enrique mastermind the new playing scheme, or Messi? Was the team winning because of the coach, or despite him?

    Those negative wonderings grew louder and louder as time went on, and by the time he left Barcelona at the end of his third season, having lost La Liga and the Champions League to Real Madrid, it was clear that his time was up.

    And there were still, even though he won nine trophies in just three years, serious doubts about whether he is actually a decent coach – reflected in the strange fact that, more than a year after leaving the Camp Nou, he has never really been seriously linked with any top jobs until now.

    In a sense, then, by accepting the challenge of leading his national team, Enrique will be back exactly where he was four years ago, tasked with overhauling a team with soaring expectations and high historical levels of success, but whose playing style has grown stale and tired.

    FC Barcelona vs Deportivo Alaves - Copa Del Rey Final

    This time, of course, the difference is that he will not have Messi – or any other player around whom his team should be built.

    At Barcelona, Enrique was to a great extent coaching with his hands tied behind his back, prevented from clearly realising his own vision – whatever vision that might have been – by the need to keep his star players, especially the front three, happy.

    With Spain, though, he will be able to do whatever he wants, and it will be fascinating to witness exactly how he goes about that process.

    What kind of coach is Luis Enrique? Even though he spent three years at Barcelona, enjoying wild levels of success for part of that time, we still don’t really know.

    But we’re about to find out.

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