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The 5 greatest Barcelona players of all time

By Harry De Cosemo

TOPSHOT - Barcelona's Argentinian forward Lionel Messi looks on during the Spanish league football match Sevilla FC vs FC Barcelona at the Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan stadium in Sevilla on November 6, 2016. / AFP / JORGE GUERRERO (Photo credit should read JORGE GUERRERO/AFP/Getty Images)
TOPSHOT - Barcelona's Argentinian forward Lionel Messi looks on during the Spanish league football match Sevilla FC vs FC Barcelona at the Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan stadium in Sevilla on November 6, 2016. / AFP / JORGE GUERRERO (Photo credit should read JORGE GUERRERO/AFP/Getty Images) /
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Xavi Hernandez of FC Barcelona during the UEFA Champions League final match between Barcelona and Juventus on June 6, 2015 at the Olympic stadium in Berlin, Germany.(Photo by VI Images via Getty Images)
Xavi Hernandez of FC Barcelona during the UEFA Champions League final match between Barcelona and Juventus on June 6, 2015 at the Olympic stadium in Berlin, Germany.(Photo by VI Images via Getty Images) /

5. Xavi Hernandez

At the height of Barcelona’s dominance under Pep Guardiola, another legendary former player and true Cruyff disciple who took his reputation to the next level as a coach, there was a saying in Catalonia. While captain Carles Puyol was the heart of the club, Xavi was the brain.

The reason the midfielder, now 36 and playing in Qatar with Al Saad after departing from the Camp Nou last year, beat his long-haired ex-teammate to this list is his relationship with Andres Iniesta, particularly between 2009 and 2013.

Xavi was an ever-present in the Barça team for around 16 years, and his time with his hometown club wasn’t always rosy. Under Frank Rijkaard, the man Laporta brought in originally to re-implement the Cruyff philosophy, Xavi and Barça won three LaLiga titles and the Champions League in 2006, but trophyless campaigns over the next two years cost the Dutchman his job and showed work was still to be done.

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Victory with Spain at Euro 2008 that summer reinvigorated Xavi ahead of working with Guardiola. From then, he never looked back and finally earned the world-class reputation his talent had always deserved, having previously been patronised and overlooked by wider media.

Passing stats showed just what he brought to the side in his prime, but he offered Barcelona a similar service to the one mentioned in the Real Madrid article about Raul. Having grown up in La Masia, the club’s youth academy which became the foundation of their success thanks to Laporta, he understood the morals of the club and what it meant to a very politically charged region of Spain.

Mention Barcelona and Xavi Hernandez’s name will follow suit. He stands as the bar for future stars to reach and fully deserves his place on this list.

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