Former Barcelona president, Josep Maria Bartomeu, made countless mistakes whilst at the club, and more will surely be uncovered in the coming weeks.
One of his last was to appoint Ronald Koeman as coach of the first-team, purely on the strength of his association with the club as a player.
This was no whimsical decision either. Koeman had been tapped up well before he was eventually persuaded to return to the Camp Nou.
Had he taken the baton earlier, the club may have been spared the disastrous reign of Quique Setien, however, Koeman has now lost more games in his first 10 matches than Setien did in the entire time he was at the club.
The Catalans are closer to the bottom of the table than they are to the top in points terms, and the 2020/21 campaign is shaping up to be one of their worst ever. It’s already their worst start since the 1987/88 season.
What’s more, this could’ve been predicted.
Koeman has never really been what could be regarded as a success as a manager. He’d last won a league championship some 14 years ago, and a Copa del Rey title, which was his last title of note for any club, came in the last decade with Valencia.
Spells at both Southampton and Everton were notable for how poorly organised both teams were.
Playing at a club gives you the understanding of the inner workings, but successes elsewhere often dictate how well things might go when you’re under the microscope in a pressure cooker job such as at Barca.
Koeman isn’t cut out for it… and the truth is he never was.