Caceres to Serie A, Hleb to Premier League
Catalan sports paper Sport reports that sources close to the club have told them that Uruguay international Martin Caceres (23) and Belarussian international Alexander Hleb (29), will leave Barcelona by the end of this week or early next week. The coaching staff wants to resolve both cases in the earliest possible time for the benefit of the players, so they can adapt to their new club as soon as possible.
Last week, Caceres, who spent last season on loan at Juventus, was reported to be close to reaching an agreement with Milan, but in the end there was no agreement on the amount of transfer between the two clubs.
At present, the Uruguayan defender has two offers from Italy, namely Sampdoria and Roma. Sampdoria are interested taking the player on loan from FC Barcelona for a season, with a purchase option included at the end of the season. While Roma who are also interested in the player are willing to make a direct purchase.
Hleb on the other hand also has two offers on the table: one from Premier League club Tottenham Hotspurs and one from La Liga club Sevilla CF. The player however is more interested in returning to the Premier League, where he had previously spent a successful three year stint at Arsenal, before joining Barcelona in the summer of 2008.
One of the conditions of Hleb is that he will only leave for a club that plays in the Champions League. Thus, FC Barcelona will be hoping that the Spurs can make a comeback from their 3-2 loss to the Young Boys, during the second leg of their UEFA Champions League qualifier that will be played on Tuesday.
Another player who is expected to leave the first team of FC Barcelona in the coming days is Victor Sanchez (22), the player spent last season on loan in the first division at Xerez CD. The versatile player has several offers from first division clubs, but if he doesn’t move by the end of the transfer market, he is expected to be part of the Barcelona B squad, who this season will be playing in the Second Division of Spain.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Yudha Asmara and Nabeel Pasha, totalBarça. totalBarça said: Caceres to Serie A, Hleb to Premier League http://bit.ly/doWvrn [...]
i dunno in my opinion if we dont sign any more players we should just keep both of them
Agreed. We can't just keep depleting our ranks like this and we are running out of time in the transfer window. I also find it slightly annoying that Victor Sanchez's reward for being joint top-scorer of the pre-season is, "Good job. Now, where do you want to go?" I mean, I don't think he deserves to be starting or anything, but he's worth keeping around with a squad as small as ours.
I have no objection to JDS or thiago, romeu , fontas or any other youngster they are amazing young players my main problem will be CB. I keep saying this almost daily, we have 3 main CB right now, Pique ,puyol milito. after selling chygrinsky and rafa left. just imagine this scenario that actually can easily happen. Puyol got injured and pique has 2 yellow cards. next game is vs chelsea or inter or even RM, so obviously milito and a youngster can step in or even milito and abidal. do you think these combos will be able to stop opponent teams from scoring on us ? NO. in DM i honestly thought yaya was the best and even though it was killing me him sitting on the bench to busquet who has waaaay less experience i still felt busquet had a good backup. Now busquet grew up to be a good DM, so i think we need someone with a decent amount of experience to back him up, NOT ANOTHER YOUNGSTER ROMEU. Alot of people here trust busquet alot and they have good reasoning to do so, from winning the world cup to other reasons but iam not one of them , dont get me wrong i support busuqet and hope he proves me and every doubter wrong but for the time being we need another experienced dm. Finally at midfield, last season xavi played almost every single minute and he was the creative mid fielder any team can wish for but imagine with him injured along with iniesta's frequent injuries what would happen ? we gona have kieta busquet and JDS in mid field. and that is somewhat week to me
Preach it brother, preach it. That is exactly how I feel, every word.
maxmaxmaz you couldn't have said it any better
Great comment bro, lots of wisdom.
It's a shame that there aren't any real efforts to get players we need right now. They gave up on Mascherano as DM, and as far as I know, there isn't a search for an experienced fourth CB
Any thoughts?
I understand what you're saying and I understand you are concerned for our squad, but if you remember a similar situation occured last year in the crucial deciding group stage game against Inter Milan in the Champions League, when both Messi and Ibra(who was almost single handedly running our team back then) were out due to injury. Everybody thought we were doomed and that we were out of the Champions League, we started with a forward line of Pedro, Henry (comopletely out of form) and Iniesta (out of position), but what we witnessed that night was the rise to stardom of the young Pedro Rodriguez, a player who nobody apart from Cules knew before that match. He literally schooled the apparent world's 'best' RB called Maicon that night in what was his first real season at the big stage.
I know you feel concerned that our squad lacks depth, that the youngsters are too inexperienced and that you think we should keep Caceres, but I have been following these kids for as long as I can remember and if there is one thing I can assure you its that Fontas and Bartra are already better than Caceres. Sure Caceres has the experience at the big stage etc. etc. something that Fontas or Bartra lack, but sometimes experience isn't the only thing in football. Remember Granero? He was hailed as the next Iniesta by the media at the begining of last seaon. I remember discussing with some madridista's before last season began, I told them that pedro was better than Granero, everyone was literally laughing at my face, saying Granero has three years of La Liga experience and that he was Getafe's best player while Pedro was a nobody coming from the third division of Spain and has no experience at the big stage, but we all saw what happened at the end of the season!
Pep isn't that naive to just blindly trust in these kids and put the club of his life on the edge. He knows exactly what he's doing, he is the one who see's these guys train day in day out not the fans. I just ask for one thing from you, keep faith in the boys, stop worrying about the squad depth and I can assure you won't be dissapointed at the end of the season.
come on guys, Sachin made a good point, there's no need for the thumbs down
the thing which is making us cules anxious is that our squad lacks depth in central defence and defensive midfield……….. I know fontas, muniesa, bartra and romeu are great talents but in the two position concerned composure is needed……… more experience the player has the more composed he is……… An experienced player can handle adversity in a better manner on the pitch!!!!!!!! this is strictly my opinion though…..
Remember Busquets? He plays in the DM position where you say composure and experience is need. Remember he came from the 'fourth' division in Spain, not even the 'third' division that the likes of Fontas, Romeu or others are coming from. He had absolutely no experience at the top level, neither was he even called up by any Spanish youth team before joining the first team. But he still came in, played in a Champions League final in his first year at the senior level, producing a brilliant performance in the final playing in DM. Like I said sometimes 'experience' isn't the only thing that matters.
Keep in mind that for a DM or CB in the Barca system, it is a lot more difficult for a player coming from outside to adapt to the system than it is for a player from within, so the inexperiece of the homegrown player kinda balances itself to the adaptibility period that you give to the newly bought player. Instead of giving that adaptibility period to a player from outside you could just give that same playing time to these talented 'inexperienced' players (which is the only way for them to become experienced) and have the same or even better result in the long term. Another plus point being the club saves millions of euros, plus most importantly the pride that we have developed another world class player. This is strictly my opinion though…
Oh f**k yeah, I clearly remember that night against Inter. The sight of an absolute rookie tormenting Maicon and Zanetti, both very experienced players in their own standard, Pedro really delivered the unbelievable.
Sachin…from your keyboard to God's eyes.
Caceras is reckless and rash and un-predictable. His tacking skills are abysmal, and the only asset he has got is speed. He would probably be a success in a team like Tottenham, West Ham etc. Expecting Caceras to take the ball out of defence surrounded by opposition attackers is suicidal. BTW, Granero is still good, just that RM has got no space for him.
Good sense of the game Max.. Just as i wanted it.. I think Pep is being too wise for my liking this season.. I love him and knows he's the best for barca but if he gets it all wrong this season then he'll go from Hero to Zero and all the acclaim will go to Mourihno.. Ozil would have been a really good signing for us than Madrid since we couldn't get Cesc and we're still reluctant in signing Masch.. Defenders? Caceres isn't good enough but better than nothing.. Sell him and back someone better or better leave him.. Hleb should stay if we don't wanna sign someone else.. I just hope and pray Madrid don't get all the praise this season cos of our mistakes
i don't understand why people want Hleb to stay when they know that he is not going to play even a single minute in the whole season… if Pep doesn't trust him there is no use paying money to him… may be he is a good player and will do well in any other club..
i hope Tottenham buys him and he does good there….
Caceres should stay cuz we lost Rafa and Chygrinsky and we should replace them atleast with a first teamer considering that caceres had a very good season with juve last year despite playing at right-back
Caceres would be quite likely to get some first team action if he stayed… Helb to actually… atleast in the copa del rey definitely…
Hleb would definitly add much needed depth.. and i think we can also keep him on the bench without feeling to guilty about it. He can play the same role that Guddy did his last couple of seasons.. He wasnt breathtaking but he was a viable back up with experience capable of playing against the big teams…
Of course everybody wants our cantenaros to come up and be first team players.. of course we dont want to suppress the progress of thiago , JDS and their like.. but the thing about really good quality is that is shows no matter what the circumstances..
If puyol, xavi, valdes, iniesta, messi, pedro , bojan , busquets could get their places in the squad inspite of us having big squads, in due course the other kids will as well.
How many players from the youth squad have we seen become great players elsewhere?? Both Cesc and Arteta (Not great but quite decent) left when they were too early to be counted as slip ups.. there was no way Cesc was going to be playing with the first team when he left..he should have had some more patience.. but whatever…
We MUST give preference to our kids but not pamper them. It cannot and should not be an easy path into the first team.. The reason why our current first team La Masia products are soooo freaking good is because they were made to fight for their spots. Take out the competition and quality will go down. That is a not a statement directed specifically towards any specific player (Thiago, JDS) but just a general statement which could affect quality in the ling term… If they are really that good they will find a way..Have some faith in their quality..
Caceres is a disaster. could help for depth but only GOD can help us if he has to play CL games for us.
Bet you have seen about 1 or 2 matches with him..
Spain had 3 players on Robben. Puyol,Sergi and Capdevila. Uruguay had one against him and his name was Cáceres. He did a brilliant job and didn't pass more wrong passes than anyone else. Rembember the match against Atl Madrid 2 years ago? Everyone though Cáceres would make us loost 0-5 but he killed Aguero sooo bad in every challange. Damn I miss Cáceres sliding tackles
3 centre backs? keep him!
Not worried bout the CB as i think Abidal is a good 4th choice CB. (Caceres obviously dont have what it takes according to Pep) I mean you cant expect another Puyol as 4th CB. This is real life. You shouldnt splash the cash on 4th choise CB (and by splash the cash i mean 10 mil+sallary which is a BIG pile of money if you think about it). Im more worried about midfield. Im not overly impressed from what ive seen from pre-season games (but ive only seen matches through a crappy stream) But last year i think we suffered tremendius when Iniesta was injured so its up to Thiago and JDS to fill that creative gap incase of injuries on Xavi/Injuries. I hope Pep knows more about them than i do (and im pretty sure he does)
Xavu/Iniesta of course. (Maybe an freudian slip)
Haha And now i wrote Xavu, but you get my point
keep caceres, let see what he can do backup alves
Thankfully there is a January transfer window and the only time I will worry about any transfers if they are required.
I still cant shake the feeling that Rossell has made a decision with the directors etc to keep a huge chunk of the transfer money he claims is available and is just putting stories out to make it look like that is not the case. . Nothing wrong with the trusting the youth either though.Shame there is this whole sporting director role, I know Pep likes the EPL because the manager has more responsibility and decision making I think we will know by October what the real status is.
It might be a rough season for Barca but either way I hope Pep is here next season and we give Real Madrid and Sevilla a tough time this season (think Sevilla will be challenging this season for the title or at least causing problems, very mature and competent side). I am also certain Pep was unhappy with the treatment of Cruyff and after it being confirmed it was Rosell who wanted to sell Chingrynsky, that makes it even more worrysome.
We should sell them NO LOAN …
I think its a shame that Hleb was never a success at Barca as i think he is a really good player. Just had the misfortune of playing in a position where there are great players there. He should leave on a permanent deal rather than a loan.
Sell, I would keep Sanchez. Good back-up and addition to Enrique's side.
The donkeys in charge of our club transfers will ensure that both of them leave for free + also pay 50% of their wages to their new clubs. As a cule, I am terribly frustrated and its time that we take them to court for this
If we aren't gonna sign any more MF then its imperative that Hleb stay as a back up of either Iniesta or Xavi. If one of them are out with an injury then its Hleb that should be the option and not Keita. Lack of Iniesta was very much felt in the Semis against Inter. I hope Pep gives a serious thought to that. Keita just isn't that kind of a player that can fill in for Xavi/Inieast.
this article is poorly written, grammatically incorrect, and really just a struggle to get through- having read many sentences over. hopefully this hadn't been edited by someone already, because that's what it really needs.
Can anybody please tell me why are we getting rid of these two players WHY?