While some debate what constitutes a decade, it's widely argued that it ends with 2019 and that means it's time to look back on the last 10 years (technically it stared in 2011 and will end in 2020, but statistically that's ugly).
The last 10 years have seen Barcelona extend the golden era which began during the last decade. Legendary footballers have excelled under the coaching of Pep Guardiola and Luis Enrique, among others. With that in mind, SPORT reached out to their readers and asked for Barça's Team of the Decade.
It wasn't an easy task. Starting in goal, where Marc ter Stegen was pitted against Victor Valdes. The German took 66 percent (more than 49,000 votes), with Valdes having to settle for 23,000 votes.
In defence, Dani Alves eased to the right-back role with 98 percent of the votes ahead of Semedo, Sergi Roberto, Montoya and Aleix Vidal. In the middle, Gerard Pique (22 percent) and Carles Puyol (77 percent) were voted in ahead of Lenglet, Umtiti and Mascherano. Jordi Alba beat Eric Abidal to the left-back spot (71 percent vs. 27 percent).
The midfield was straight forward: Sergio Busquets behind Xavi Hernandez and Andres Iniesta. Xavi (64 percent) was the most voted for midfielder.
There weren't many surprises in attack, where the MSN were the clear winners. Lionel Messi took 98 percent of the votes, Luis Suarez took 76 percent in the No9 role ahead of David Villa (20 percent) and Zlatan Ibrahimovic, while Neymar (60 percent) was voted in on the left ahead of Pedro Rodriguez (12 percent) and Thierry Henry, who was second with 26 percent.
YashKondekar
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