Where next for Messi and Barca?

The 'greatest club team on the planet' were dumped out of the Champions League this week with Guardiola also stepping down leaving his tika-taka disciples in the hands of his assistant Tito Vilanova. 

Guardiola revealed in an emotional press conference that he had been having doubts about his role at Barcelona since October and that the la Masia graduate was applauded off the stage by his employers and current players reveals the level of admiration the man will forever enjoy at Barca.

Despite the clubs success over the last four years the head coach role at Barcelona is one of the most pressurised roles in club football. We think football is king in England, but the fervour Barcelona and Real Madrid inspire in Spain surpasses it, the dual club dominance only rackets up the pressure at these two great institutions.

Sadly for football purists Guardiola decided to leave the club, indicating that he found it difficult to keep motivating the players and that he himself had burnt out. The timing of the announcement is puzzling as Barcelona still have the Copa del Rey final to compete for in May, and may have been influenced by the raw exit they suffered mid-week and the Real defeat at the weekend.

They may have suffered disappointment in Europe and in the race for La Liga but that should not prompt a wholesale change of approach. Vilanova's appointment will presumably see as little transition as possible; two defeats in the space of a week do not make this Barcelona squad a bad side and the Spaniard will be hoping he can build on Pep Guardiola's incredible legacy.

Arsene Wenger was one of the first coaches to express his sadness that Guardiola had stepped down, and I find myself agreeing with his own desire to have seen the youngest ever Champions League winner return next year with full trust in his philosophy and fight back.

Wenger posited : "The philosophy of Barcelona has to be bigger than winning or losing a championship. Guardiola is one of the representatives of this philosophy and made this philosophy triumph so I would have loved him, even going through a disappointing year, to stay and come back and insist with his philosophy. That would be interesting."

Guardiola knows the club inside out and would have been one of the best man to helm Barcelona towards further success without radically altering their ideology. The appointment of Vilanova is the next best thing and he has the greatest chance of replicating Guardiola's success. Both graduated at the same time from Barcelona's famed la Masia academy and the assistant has been working with Guardiola for over five years.

However, while Guardiola went on to play for and captain his beloved Barcelona side for almost a decade, Vilanova didn't quite make the grade at the Nou Camp and his playing career reached a nadir at Celta and Mallorca. Guardiola's playing experience on the biggest of stages must have shaped him as a manager and it will be interesting to see how Vilanova interprets the Barcelona ideology with his, by contrast, inferior playing career.

For a club of Barcelona's recent success and domination in Spain and continentally, to finish the season with only one major trophy, looking likely to be the Copa del Rey, is simply a disappointment when compared to their previous three seasons.

Barcelona may have already claimed the the European Super Cup, Spanish Super Cup and the World Club Championship but these competitions are not the pinnacle of a footballers career, winning these trophies will hardly go down in history.

In the space of three games Barcelona have gone from playing the best football in Europe to a season in disintegration. This is partly bound up in media hyperbole, but the Barcelona of Tuesday night looked an entirely different proposition to the swaggering unit that put seven past Bayern Leverkusen.

Tiredness can affect players mentally and physically and it looked as if the creativity that we associate with the current Barcelona side had dried up. Barcelona started Tuesday night brightly, Messi should have scored when one-on-one with Cech, before the Catalans stepped up a gear and hit a goal either side of John Terry's ridiculous red card.

However, after Messi's penalty miss the 2011 Champions League holders started to wane in confidence. Passes were sprayed wide to no great success and the Barcelona midfield did not have the confidence or mentality to play through the middle of Chelsea's back nine. Gone were the one-twos that dissected the very best of defences as Guardiola's men grew in insecurity and desperation as the match wore on. There was a real crisis of confidence and Barcelona looked as if they didn't have faith in their own system of play.

Messi seemed determined to make amends for his penalty mistake and although he forced a brilliant save from Petr Cech he failed to play in two well-placed Barcelona players in the second half.

Guardiola took objection to comments before the match that alleged that Messi was on a goal drought, of two whole games, and the 24-year-old drew another blank against Chelsea on Tuesday. Messi is clearly the focal point in the current Barca side and there have been accusations that they are overly reliant on his magic to overcome teams.

His re-positioning to a false number 10 position since Guardiola took the hot seat has coincided with the Argentinian winning three successive Ballon D'Or's and Barcelona's recent trophy surge. He hit a phenomenal 38 goals the season before Pep came in, but since becoming the orchestrator and finisher off the Barcelona brush-strokes he has finished the last three campaigns with 47, 53 and so far this year 63 goals.

Messi is still the best player in the world. His nearest competitor choked in the Champions League again on Wednesday and Messi hasn't become a worse player after three low-key performances. Barcelona simply came up against three defences that put in better performances then the Catalan offensive line and failed to break them down.

The loss of Guardiola will become more quantifiable next season, but to promote from within, from their own academy in effect, is a shrewd move and given time Vilanova may be able to forge his own Barcelona legacy. Barcelona have become more than a club, more an idealistic interpretation of football, and to make any wholesale changes on the back of two defensive master classes and two disappointing performances would be a gross mistake.

Parker for Poland and Ukraine

The Football Association acted today to remove the England captaincy from John Terry, in a move which has deliberately undercut Fabio Capello. Terry, who again decided not to resign the armband, did appear to have the backing of the England manager but Chelsea’s wish for the court case to be played out after the European Championship was a stretch of faith too far for FA executives.

His second dismissal from the role leaves Capello in a quandary, as he must again appoint a new captain in time for this summer despite them well knowing that they were second choice. Rio Ferdinand has already ruled himself out of the running, citing his experience of having the captaincy stripped away from him by Capello and alluding to a serious breakdown in relations with the Italian.

Following Capello’s own logic and painful experience from South Africa, the third in line appears to be Liverpool skipper, Steven Gerrard. Whether Gerrard, who is flung the armband when England drift from one crisis to another, would want the cast-off honour remains questionable, but like Ferdinand before him his recent injury record might make the pragmatic Capello think outside of his 30 plus box.

Frank Lampard and Gareth Barry have captained their country before but are not guaranteed a place in England’s starting XI, even more so if current form is taken into consideration. Rooney has game-time leading his country but his petulance and suspension for the first two games in Ukraine casts doubt on how he would handle such a role.

As Capello enters into the final six months of his England career the temptation for the 65 year old would be to play safe and appoint one of the aforementioned names, with experience in captaining their country. However, to many a more appealing prospect would be the introduction of a younger talent, one who could lead England for the next ten years. A younger generation free from the disappointment and pressure of the so called ‘golden generation’ and their flop at the last two World Cups.

Names like Jack Wilshire, Phil Jones and Joe Hart will be thrown loosely into the hat, although at present only Joe Hart is an established England international. Gary Speed was reaping the benefits of naming then 20 year old Aaron Ramsey as permanent captain before his untimely death, and England would do well to learn from this. England need to begin blooding a new generation of players who are comfortable with the ball at their feet and not just suited to the frenetic pace of the Premier League.

Having said that one player who must be considered, even if it is solely to lead the side to Poland and Ukraine, is Scott Parker. Alongside Michael Carrick, Parker has been the standout English central midfielder this season and his role in Harry Redknapp’s Tottenham Hotspur side has been the difference between them challenging for a Champions League berth and challenging for the league.

To describe him as a tough-tackling holding player is to do Parker a disservice. The former West Ham captain through a series of spectacular goals, Churchillian half-time speech’s and box-to-box raiding which saw him named FWA player of the year for 2010-2011. In his criminally few appearances for England he has managed to stake his place in Capello’s thoughts and now looks a guaranteed starter, injury permitting.

Although at 31 he may only have two major tournaments left in him, his sense of throwback to years gone by (just watch him do an interview) and a passion to play for his country means that he deserves a shot on the grandest of stages. He already seems a lynchpin in England’s new three man midfield and what better way to utilise his talent then to send a 23 man squad to the European Championships this summer, then with Scott Parker at the helm.