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#2 Tiki-Taka Barca
Even those with the most minimal football knowledge are able to recognise that Barcelona play football in an extra special way. While Messi and company continue to revolutionise the game with their ongoing string of accolades, their match-day approach has always remained the same throughout time.
Indeed the stylistic approach employed by Barcelona today was born from the mind of Johan Cruyff. After strolling into the club in 1988, the Dutchman shook up personal but tweaked the club’s tactical set-up in a way that would change the shape of the modern football picture. Drab defensive focus was absent and the midfield became overloaded with numbers in a ground-breaking 3-4-3 formation. Focus was placed on ball retention and scoring goals as opposed to grounding out 1-0 results.
Cruyff hypothesised that when a team had the ball, they moved better and Barcelona began exposing teams in a far more narrow shape. Under Cruyff’s stewardship, the club went on to win four league titles, one European cup, one cup winners cup and one Spanish cup.
Pep Guardiola was very much the fulcrum of that side and orchestrated the transition of such ideologies to the Barca of today and with ball retention a key aspect installed into the Catalonian's’ youth side, it seems this tradition will live long with Barcelona.
