I believe it is astonishing that Madrid is dominating because in 2011, Barca looked dead certain to dominate the next decade. They rejunevated the 2009 team, replacing Etoo and Henry without much fuss and Messi was only 23 with already two CLs to his name.
Barca and Messi should have won more CLs because as of now, Messi never dominated the world scene like his peers did. You have players like Di Stefano, Cryuff or Ronaldo winning 3 or more CLs in a row or players like Pele or Maradona dominating world cups along the way. It is not that Messi doesn‘t deserve to be in this company based on his performances, but his big trophies are some way behind. He has 2 CLs less than Ronaldo now, ffs
Madrid is a weird case because they are dominating while their best players are very old now. Ronaldo, Ramos, Modric and Benzema are all on the wrong side of 30 and still produce the goods.
Xavi had an unbelievably sharp decline as soon as he got older, outrun and outfought by many midfields. Iniesta lost his consistency on his old days, delivering some great performances on key occasions like the Cup final this year but all in all, his performances have not been good the past few seasons. Even Messi is declining, despite him still scoring and creating in LaLiga like no other. He isn‘t able to influence big games in CL like he used to in 2011, look at Roma this year or 180 minutes no goals against Juve last year.
I feel like Barca had a really great platform to dominate this decade with Messi, world class talent from La Masia like Xavi and Iniesta and they managed to grab Suarez and Neymar, the next best players of this decade. Somehow, they got it wrong along the way. I believe getting Cesc in 2011 was the starting point.
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