Five big-money signings for Spanish club ‘Barcelona’ from English clubs who later went to become famous flops for the club.

Players always have a desire to play for their dream Club once in their career. However, some go on to their dream clubs but fail to make a mark. The Spanish club ‘Barcelona‘ is very famous for its dominance and glory over the years.

However, every club has a list of players who they want to forget signed for them. Players in England have a desire to play for foreign clubs after their hard work and recognition. We will look at 5 players who Barcelona shipped from England and later were termed as ‘flops’ –

1. Barcelona’s new attacking player: Alexander Hleb

Hleb joined Barcelona from Arsenal in 2008 for £11.8 million. It was expected that he would go and become Barca’s important player for Pep Guardiola. Instead, he showed bad discipline and never had the chance to make a mark at the club.

Hleb often arrived late for training and never showed the alertness needed on the pitch. Thus, these circumstances brought lack of chance to shine and hence Barca sold him the next year.

2. Luis Figo’s Replacement: Marc Overmars

Overmars was brought in by Barcelona to replace Luis Figo at the club. However, the former Arsenal winger failed to live up to the expectations. Overmars was not an instant hit although showing some moments of magic to the side.

 Barcelona splashed £25 million on the player in 2000 which created further hype for the player. The player cost so much and had some big boots to fill in but couldn’t do it.

3. Defender with a lot of injuries: Thomas Vermaelen

Vermaelen signed for Barcelona in 2014 for €19 million. The former Arsenal defender was a perfect match for the Spanish side. He excelled in aerial ability, strength, and pace which are more suited for Barcelona.

However, he had so many injuries at his time at Barcelona that he only featured in 34 league games in 4 years at the club. Moreover, when he played those games he never looked sharp and a top-quality defender. Thomas Vermaelen eventually departed in 2019 for Vissel Kobe.

4. World Cup winner signed by Barcelona: Emmanuel Petit

Petit joined Barcelona along with Overmars in 2000 for a fee near to €14 million. He suffered from a lot of niggling injuries and playing him out of the position. As a result, he never settled at the club and was shipped to Chelsea a year later.

However, the French international won a World cup and Euro with his national side. Petit was very comfortable alongside Patrick Vieira but couldn’t replicate his performances in Barcelona.

5. Made for Barcelona: Philippe Coutinho

Phil Coutinho still with the Spanish club was brought to the club for a club-record fee of £145 million. This deal made him the third most expensive player behind Kylian Mbappe and Neymar.

Coutinho is an excellent attacking midfielder who prefers to play at a no 10 position. However, Ernesto Valverde often deployed him as a winger or a left-hand side midfielder. As a result, it was difficult trying to fit him into Barcelona’s system alongside Messi.

In addition to that, fans jeered at him, Brazilian didn’t like that a bit and made a controversial celebration after scoring a goal. This made the club looking to get rid of the player as soon as possible.

Thus, he went on to loan for Bayern Munich and has done quite well since joining until the injury. However, the deal is hard to get permanent as Barcelona are demanding £90 million for the player. Bayern Munich is reluctant to pay that much amount and will send the player back to Barcelona. However, it will be interesting how Barcelona find a way to get rid of Coutinho.

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