Xavi’s announcement that he will leave Barcelona this summer came as both a shock and a relief to many.
The club legend, who had just won La Liga’s title six months earlier, was watching his side collapse in front of his very eyes, with fans and pundits alike all questioning whether he was really the man for the job.
Here’s how it all went wrong for Xavi.
Xavi was backed heavily in the summer of 2022, with Barcelona moving heaven, earth and shares of Barca Studios to raise the money to fund a shopping spree which featured the £42.5m signing of Robert Lewandowski from Bayern Munich.
One of the greatest strikers the world has ever seen, Lewandowski bagged 23 goals in his first La Liga campaign and was crucial to the team’s title triumph. It seemed like the perfect fit.
Nobody knew it at the time, but this signing would ultimately play a major role in Xavi’s departure. The boss’ faith in Lewandowski, whose goals would dry up in 2023/24, left many fans questioning his decisions.
Everybody knew the mess Barcelona were in back in 2022 but, while nobody was expecting them to win the Champions League, there was no way they should have been eliminated from the group stage without even playing their final two games.
Big money had been spent on the likes of Lewandowski, Jules Kounde and Raphinha, as well as the free transfers of Andreas Christensen, Franck Kessie and Marcos Alonso, but Xavi failed to make his team competitive in the competition which has always mattered most to Barcelona fans.
This wasn’t fatal, but this elimination did start spreading doubts about Xavi’s ability to hang with Europe’s elite.
Having figured out a way to tighten up his side’s defence, Xavi watched Barcelona romp to their 27th La Liga title in May 2023.
Clearly, this isn’t a bad thing. In fact, it might have been what kept Xavi in a job for so long.
The pressure was now even higher on Xavi, who had seen his side win even while in crisis. If Barcelona were capable of domestic glory in a year of chaos, just imagine what they can do when they start to get more stable in 2023/24?
With veteran midfielder Sergio Busquets leaving the club, Xavi spoke openly about his need for a new midfielder. Busquets may never have been the flashiest member of Barcelona’s midfield, but he was arguably the most important for the best part of a decade.
The likes of Martin Zubimendi and Joshua Kimmich were suggested by Xavi, but new sporting director Deco argued there wasn’t enough money to get such a deal done. Ultimately, former La Masia talent Oriol Romeu was recruited from Girona for a reported £4m.
Meanwhile, Deco struck a deal to sign 18-year-old striker Vitor Roque for an initial £26m, with a further £26m in bonuses. Roque wouldn’t even join the club until January 2024, having initially been slated to arrive the following summer. There was enough money for that deal, somehow.
There was a changing of the guard in the summer of 2023. Busquets signed on with Inter Miami on July 16 and left-back Jordi Alba joined four days later, having agreed to terminate his contract one year early.
While both players were getting on in years and no longer at the peak of their powers, Busquets and Alba were respected figures in the dressing room and their departures, while necessary financially, undoubtedly took their toll on the squad.
The ‘Barca DNA’ of which Xavi spoke so fondly now belonged solely to utility man Sergi Roberto and a handful of youngsters.
When Jules Kounde first joined Barcelona, it was reported that he had specifically asked Xavi not to play him at right-back. The Frenchman didn’t get his wish in 2022/23 but was shifted central the following year at the expense of another centre-back, Ronald Araujo.
Araujo added to the tactical headache in December when he confessed he too was not happy playing out on the right. While he publicly backed Xavi on a number of occasions, including just hours before confirmation of his departure, this statement only added to the tactical headache facing Xavi.
Another centre-back, Andreas Christensen, had admitted to being disappointed over being benched to let Kounde and Araujo play centrally – a fair statement from one of the title-winning season’s top performers. Cracks were starting to show.
Catalan rivals Girona were flying in La Liga’s title race but surely had to be knocked down a peg or two when they made the trip over to Barcelona in December, right?
With Kounde back playing on the right, Barcelona were well beaten by their underdog rivals. Normally, Xavi’s side had managed to snatch results while playing poorly, but Girona were in no mood to hand out points on this occasion.
It was at this point that doubts began to creep in. If Barcelona weren’t going to win games, was their underwhelming style of play really worth it?
Unlike the previous season, Barcelona had few troubles in the Champions League group stage in 2023/24 and had already booked their place in the knockout stages when the final game came around.
Keen to give his youngsters a run-out and ease the pressure on his side for one night, Xavi was met with resistance from those above him at Barcelona, who wanted to see the big names involved in the dead rubber. The final team would be a mixed bag and they would go on to lose 3-2.
The defeat itself meant little, but for the atmosphere and tensions behind the scenes, it only made things significantly worse.
Having been Spain’s best team last season, Barcelona wanted to add even more trophies this season, but January brought their hopes crashing down.
They were thumped 4-1 by Real Madrid in the Supercopa de Espana on January 14 final, putting on a timid display which had Xavi seething, and just a few days later, the humiliation would continue as Barcelona needed to come from behind to beat third-tier Unionistas in the Copa del Rey round of 16.
In the quarter-finals six days later, Barcelona would be dumped out with a 4-2 loss to Athletic Club. The two easiest trophies to win were gone, and so was the patience of a number of supporters.
Lewandowski’s goals had dried up and the veteran striker was offering very little in attack by the time January arrived. Roque’s introduction to the team was sped up to try and inject some life into Barca’s team, but it quickly became clear that wasn’t going to happen.
In the defeat to Athletic Club, Xavi hauled Lewandowski off with ten minutes to go in regular time, when the score was 2-2. When he needed a goal, Xavi did not turn to the expensive Roque, but rather 18-year-old academy striker Marc Guiu.
The questions soon followed. Was Roque a club signing unwanted by Xavi? The spotlight was cranked up just a little brighter.
When Villarreal took a 2-0 lead away from home against Barcelona on January 27, the writing appeared to be on the wall.
Xavi did turn things around at half-time, however, making three substitutions and watching as his side clawed their way into a 3-2 lead. That optimism wouldn’t last long, however, as Villarreal would net three more times to leave Barcelona ten points behind in La Liga’s title race.
Optimism from fans had gone and, as Xavi admitted after the game, his positivity had been beaten out of him. The negativity from fans, the media and those in charge at the club had worn him out to a dangerous extent, and Xavi finally put himself out of his misery by announcing his departure.
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