So far this pre-season, Barcelona have drawn against Chelsea, lost to Manchester United and Fiorentina and mustered a narrow win over LA Galaxy.
With four games played, and only one resulting in victory for the Blaugrana, is it time for the reigning Spanish and European champions to be worried? Have they become complacent after last season’s successes? Are other teams working out how to counteract them?
Luis Suárez has now scored three goals for Barcelona in pre-season. Watch the Ivan Rakitić assist though. pic.twitter.com/9NL6fZg4Q4
— Squawka Football (@Squawka) August 2, 2015
In a word: no. If anything, Barca’s poor form on paper over the past few weeks demonstrates one thing: pre-season results are virtually irrelevant. Friendly fixtures simply have little bearing upon what happens when the serious action gets underway, for several reasons.
Firstly, many teams are understrength at this time of year, choosing to reserve their strongest line-ups for the onset of the competitive season. And Barca are certainly an example, with their five-strong contingent of South American players who competed in the Copa America – including Lionel Messi and Neymar – not playing at all yet in pre-season. Clearly, removing two of the team’s most important performers is bound to have a negative impact on results.
Pretty much every pre-season game also contains a plethora of substitutions, as managers take their only opportunities to give a decent amount of playing time to every member of their squads. Naturally, this barrage of substitutions – such as Manchester United boss Louis van Gaal replacing his entire starting XI during the friendly against Barca – badly disrupts the rhythm and flow of a contest, rendering them nothing like competitive fixtures.
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And the lack of motivation for players is also highly significant. This is especially the case for elite teams such as Barca, whose players are expected to battle for every major title and therefore understandably drop their intensity when nothing is at stake. None of this is to suggest friendlies are completely pointless. They are valuable exercises in allowing players to regain match fitness after losing sharpness during a few weeks on the beach.
On an individual level, they can also allow previously neglected or out of form players to state their cases for a place in the team once the serious business starts – Real Madrid’s Jese Rodriguez is an example of a man who is doing exactly that at the moment. And for coaches, it can be a time of experimentation, familiarising their players with new tactical formulas which may need to be employed during the coming months, such as new Madrid boss Rafa Benitez’s current tinkering with his forward line.
The results, however, simply do not matter – as demonstrated by the fact Manchester United enjoyed a wonderful summer last year but then endured a horrible start to the competitive campaign. Sponsors and broadcasters might attempt to convince us otherwise as they hype up their artificially conceived yet potentially lucrative ‘tournaments’ – admitting players and managers don’t actually care about results would hardly be the best way to market these events.
But we shouldn’t allow ourselves to be fooled. Give the pre-season campaign the limited attention it deserves as a gentle warm-up period, sure, but certainly don’t fret if your team loses a few games or, for that matter, get carried away if they are looking invincible.
