Can you better Barca?
Thursday 12 May 2011 17:24, UK
Will Barca conquer Europe? Can their domestic domination go on? Guillem Balague's here!
Guillem answers your La Liga questions
It's official. La Liga belongs to Barcelona. Pep Guardiola's men confirmed their third successive Spanish championship following their midweek draw at Levante and can now focus their attention on the Champions League Final against Manchester United at the end of the month. So can the kings of Spain conquer Europe? And will their domestic domination continue next season? Those are just some of the questions that our Spanish football expert Guillem Balague has been tackling this week. Guillem answers your posers here on skysports.com every week throughout the season, so read on for his latest views...WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?
Hi Guillem. It's been another fantastic season but looking ahead to the next campaign, people keep mentioning that Real Madrid could well catch Barcelona, but what do you think? Surely if Barcelona get their reported transfer targets - Fabregas, Rossi and Monreal - and La Masia products such as Thiago, Jeffren and Fontas progress well then surely the Catalans have every chance of continuing to dominate? Shane.
GUILLEM SAYS: What I would say about Real Madrid is that it seems they don't work on the way they attack in training. Jose Mourinho reckons that spending minutes together on the pitch during games makes the team attack better and he doesn't like to prepare that in training. So the more time that passes, the better they are going to attack and I think there's going to be an improvement next season. You can see they're going to have a much more versatile midfield with Nuri Sahin arriving and it seems Hamit Altıntop of Bayern Munich could also be on his way.
Of course, Barcelona will improve as well with Giuseppe Rossi or Alexis Sanchez and perhaps Cesc Fabregas. They will try to get him and, as you say in your question, the young players will break through. Mourinho thinks the key to next season is that Carles Puyol and Xavi have got one more year. And also how will Cesc adapt to life on the bench if he moves to the Camp Nou? I get the impression that things will be closer in the league and I also feel we will see a much more attacking Real Madrid with the players Mourinho will have at his disposal.
VICENTE VALUE
Kaka and Benzema up for sale? Where do you think they will go? Also, is Vicente not available to someone like Liverpool who could pay a nominal fee to Valencia for his services. Daniel Vaughan (Barcelona)
GUILLEM SAYS: There will be changes at Real Madrid. Kaka is wanted by Milan and Karim Benzema is up for sale (I wonder if anybody wants him). Also, the Vicente situation is interesting because he will go on a free this summer and I cannot believe that there are no teams in the Premier League that wouldn't want to sign this 29-year-old - and by the way, he would love to come to England. There has been contact between his agent and about five Premier League teams, but nobody has come in big time for him yet because they haven't seen him play much and there are doubts about his physical state.