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Barcelona announced the results of an internal vote of first team players to decide the captain for the 2014/15 season.
The chosen players are Xavi Hernández, Andrés Iniesta, Leo Messi and Sergio Busquets, in that order. Xavi had been second choice for the past six seasons behind Carles Puyol and has now assumed the top responsibility after the centre-back left the club. Messi and Busquets are in contention for the first time ever replacing Puyol and third choice Victor Valdes who also left the Blaugrana at the end of the last season.
There is some surprise over the exclusion of centre-back Gerard Pique who had a poor last season and Argentine World Cup finalist Javier Mascherano.
Barcelona will hope this new four-way captaincy split will help them put on a better show than last season where they were pipped to all major trophies by their rivals from Madrid.
Here is a video showing Barcelona’s four new captains
Buy the new Barcelona 2014/15 kit here
