And presaging what’s ahead while riffing on an Olympic theme, as only Kyle Whelliston can.

(via @MessiStats)

Blogs a Blaugrana devotée, and it appears to be in translation:

Everyone knows that Barça have a very obvious, top-down, self-imposed style. This doesn’t happen a lot in football. Part of the bickering over the cantera in Madrid this season turns on their current lack of a ‘house style’. Castilla [sic] doesn’t play like the first team, Mourinho grumbled, and it should.

While us cules had a quick chuckle at the soap opera for once not playing out in our own house, I wonder if any regular watchers of Barça B felt a tiny shred of sympathy for his complaint. After all, it sounded awfully similar to our own complaints about Barça B under Eusebio, who sticks out like a sore thumb because the rest of the system at Barça strives to replicate the ‘house style’.

Having a long-term plan, a clear way of working towards consistent goals, tends to be a good thing for most organisations. Barça decided years ago that it was going to pursue success through a particular style of play. Setting such a course reduced the chances of short term, drastic lurches, which is a valuable check against our natural tendency towards volatility.