FOREVER IN THE SHADOW OF MSN??: Barcelona have spent over €500 million trying to build a new Trident

The famous Barcelona Trident MSN, involving Messi, Suarez and Neymar was arguably the best trio in history, scoring and assisting many goals between them at the camp nou.

Since the departure of Neymar, Barcelona have spent over half a billion euros to build another fearsome front line but it hasn’t gone well.

Barcelona Trident History

Barcelona has always been known to favour a 4-3-3 setup since the era of Johan Cruyff. Over the years the club has built immense front lines.

Messi-Eto- Henry, Ronaldinho-Eto-Messi, Messi-Pedro-Villa amongst so many others have graced the camp nou grass.

In a bid to fill the void left by Neymar in 2017, Bartomeu splashed over €200million in signing Ousmane Dembele and Philippe Coutinho.

Gerard Deulofeu was brought in too but all these names were just that – names. None really got the ground running.

Coach Ernesto Valverde had to tweak his tactics and took a more direct approach with 4-4-2.

Malcolm was brought in with Vidal often playing upfront. Coutinho and Dembele never contributed much

Barcelona and Bartomeu were desperate to land and build the ideal front three as all big money signings failed and left Messi and Suarez alone in attack.

Arrival of Griezmann

After the 2018 World Cup it seem Antoine Griezmann would be the perfect fit in that front line.

Bartomeu splashed over €100million to get his man and the Frenchman failed too. He couldn’t fit into the same system as Messi and Suarez.

When Ronald Koeman was brought in, his first order of action was to send Suarez packing, leaving just Messi

Trincao was brought in and wasn’t really given enough time, Ansu showed glimpse of talent too.

Andre Gomes, Denis Suarez, Rafinha, Kevin Prince Boateng, and Martin Braithwaite are others to have been signed without setting the place alight.

Heading into this weekends game, Xavi has returned and brought back with him the famous 4-3-3 that’s synonymous with the club.

There are abundance of forwards at the club currently with Dembele, Ansu, Luuk, Adama, Aubameyang, Braithwaite and Ferran at their disposal.

Against atleti, Xavi tweaked his tactics, playing Gavi as a false winger instead.

It is however expected, that the coach would play his ideal front three against espanyol

With Adama, Aubameyang and Ferran Torres it seem that Barcelona have found their ideal front three.

Adama is strong, fast and skillful, Aubameyang is a born poacher and in a good system, he’ll flourish, Ferran however seem like the ideal Barcelona forward, the David Villa kind.

These three have whatnot takes to torment and disturb any defensive setup in la liga and possibly Europe, however it remains to be seen how they’ll turn out.

No matter the outcome or how promising they might be, fact remains that MSN might be too big of a shoe for any trio to fill and will always be in their shadows.