A quick thread outlining how I think Barça can be improved, with minimal investment and some departures.

To play any sort of a possession heavy system effectively, Barça need expendable legs. That means no more lopsided pressing (with certain players taking most of the workload) and an emphasis on collective first and second wave pressure.

This is why this season has been a trainwreck. No legs in this side, which means no effective counterpressing.

Time and again, teams have just packed the middle vs Barça and have kept runners on the wing, to allow quick distribution and movement on counters.

A big vulnerability has been the 3v2's against Barça's interiors, which are very easy to create since Barça don't press the opposition dm (as a long term trend).

This allows for easy distribution out wide.

Now, I'm not well versed with Koeman and his style, but an improvement starts with the legs. Barça are faced with their worst pressing numbers in years, and it's only going to get worse.

It's irrelevant how he does it (throwing out veterans, bringing in youth, etc) but the bottom line is this: you want to challenge for the top, you need to press.

Moreover, another massive (well documented) problem is Barça's centrality, as mentioned above.

Barça offer no threat out wide, except for stretched full-backs (who endanger a leaky defense in that case).

Now, how can this be rectified? A lot of the solutions were explored by Setién, but his execution and lack of personnel let him down.

A shape to explore is the 3-2-5, which we saw vs Bilbao, and more.

This would see a midfielder (de Jong) drop into the left of defence, whilst the full-backs push into zone 15-18/13-16 respectively.

The two interiors would be tasked with progression and distribution into the box whilst the front three would look to stretch the pitch centrally and out wide.

When Setién used this 3 man box strategy, he used Messi as a sort of shuttler, alongside Arthur.

This could easily be done with Riqui and Messi or even Riqui and another 8 (incase... Well you know).

The role of the front three would be vital. They'd need to do what Barça cannot do at all; stretch the pitch both ways.

Dembélé, Griezmann and Ansu is an option. With Messi, a more b2b midfielder could be positioned near the box.

The full-backs would also need to be smarter, and supplement the runs of the forwards, especially in the half-spaces.

Setién tried this approach, but with Semedo, Alba, Suárez, etc it was never going to work.

Out of possession, this system could shuttle into a 4-4-2, with the full-backs dropping back and the midfield packed.

Here, I'd actually use one of the interiors in the first wave press. Ideally Riqui. His manic pressing could be key, especially if we're unable to sign players.

In essence, this is a variation of a 4-3-3. What it allows is for Koeman to use Frenkie in his preferred zone, and a semblance of width, with the right personnel.

However Barça need to think of departures and arrivals right now. Without that, even the best tactican is doomed.