Ernesto Valverde must go after latest Champions League failure at Barcelona

To win La Liga, Barça had to overcome 19 teams over the course of 38 games and nine months, with all sorts of weather conditions, timings, suspensions and injuries.

Valverde has not only succeeded in doing that, but he has done so twice consecutively, losing only four games along the way – two of which came in the latter stages of the campaign (against Levante last season and at Celta Vigo on Saturday night) when the title had already been secured.

Last season’s league trophy was won by a margin of 14 points over second placed Atlético Madrid, and the gap at the moment is nine points with two games to go.

That, without any doubt, is utter dominance, and Valverde deserves a lot of credit as the man who oversaw his team on their long slog to back-to-back titles.

There is of course, a but. In fact, there are two buts, and they are colossal. But Roma. But Liverpool.

Valverde, no matter how long he stays at Barça and no matter what he goes on to achieve for the remainder of his managerial career, will forever be damned his association with those two shocking results. He will always be remembered as the manager who was knocked out of the Champions League by squandering three goal leads two years in a row.

Whether or not it is fair to judge Valverde by a couple of games rather than his overall body of work, that’s just the way things work. It’s the same for all managers, as Jurgen Klopp will discover if Liverpool now don’t win the Champions League Final and he is lambasted as the man who always finishes second, with the wider transformation he has effected at Anfield overlooked.

Managers are judged by one-off results, and they are especially judged by one-off results in the most important games. Just look at Real Madrid, where Zidane escaped with a golden glow thanks to a (fortuitously gained) Champions League triumph despite a shambolic league campaign, and then his successor Julen Lopetegui was ditched mainly because he lost 5-1 at Barcelona.

And in that respect, it cannot be denied that Valverde has failed horribly by presiding over calamitous collapses in his team’s most important games of two consecutive seasons.

Two years in a row, the Champions League was there for Barça’s taking. Liverpool were not as strong last year as they are now and Madrid were easily beatable too; while this year holding off Liverpool would have meant a final against Tottenham or Ajax, by no means European superpowers.

And make no mistake, more than any other the Champions League is the trophy Barça want to win and think they should be winning, especially this year after a season which had been haunted by the ghosts of Rome.

For the last 12 months, Barça have been furiously focused on banishing those demons by going all the way in the continental stage. It was, without any doubt, their number one priority. And they had such a great chance, but then they blew it.

A golden rule of coaching is that players must not commit the same mistake twice, and any player who breaks that command will soon lose their place in the team.

By overseeing a repeat of the meltdown in Rome, Valverde has done exactly that. The same mistake twice. A second leg collapse with the Champions League crown almost within reach. A tie that Barca had under complete control but then imploded, unable to withstand the spirited efforts of their opponents. They faced pressure, and they wilted.

That kind of mental lapse, ultimately, can only be attributed to the manager. Especially when, breaking the golden rule, it happens twice.

Valverde must go, and he can’t really have any complaints. It might not be fair, but it’s the way things work.