5 players ruined by FC Barcelona

FC Barcelona have a stellar reputation as one of the greatest clubs in the world. Of course, a huge chunk of credit goes to the phenomenal players who have played for the club, but La Masia, the famous youth academy of Barca, deserves a worthy mention for the world-class talent it has churned out in the recent years.

Messi, Xavi, Pique, Iniesta, Puyol and many more-- the academy has gifted the football world with some of the best we have seen and we can never thank it enough.

But even though La Blaugrana have created legends, the club has also witnessed some ships being wrecked at the Nou Camp. Not every player or youngster has made it to the first team due to the world-class talent that Barca have had at their disposal in the recent years.

Let's have a look at five of these players who were ruined by the club.

#5 Dmytro Chygrynskiy

The 2008-09 season was probably one of the greatest seasons Barca have ever played. Standing with the treble in hand at the end of the campaign, the Barca board were bound to give Pep Guardiola a good transfer kitty for summer shopping.

Everyone remembers how Zlatan Ibrahimovic arrived at the Nou Camp that year and had a total fiasco of a season before departing the club. Another player who made his way to Barca was Dymytro Chygrynskiy, a £20 million signing from Shakhtar Donetsk as the club's most expensive defender back then.

The Ukranian, however, failed to make his mark owing to the sturdy partnership of Puyol and Pique, garnering only 851 minutes under his belt during his tenure at the Nou Camp.

Guardiola was reluctant to sell him, viewing him as a long-term prospect. But president Joan Laporta initiated his sale back to Shakhtar in lieu of £15 million, in order to aid the ailing financial conditions of the club back then.

The Ukranian was never able to play again for a club of the stature of Barcelona and currently plies his trade at AEK Athens in Greece.

1 / 5 NEXT

Published 12 Jan 2018, 11:26 IST

7 comments