Barcelona sporting director Jordi Cruyff insisted the side's host of new additions joined in order to "follow their dream" as he hit out at criticism of the Blaugrana's transfer policy.
Despite concerns regarding the club's finances, Barcelona acquired Robert Lewandowski, Raphinha, Jules Kounde, Franck Kessie, Andreas Christensen, Hector Bellerin and Marcos Alonso during a busy transfer window.
Xavi's new-look team have impressed this season, taking 13 points from their first five matches in LaLiga, but many onlookers were surprised by their ability to outmanoeuvre their rivals in the market.
Raphinha and Kounde, for instance, were both strongly linked with Chelsea before arriving at Camp Nou. Cruyff, however, insists Barca retain a unique draw.
"Barcelona has a magnet, it is beautiful," Cruyff told Guillem Balague ahead of the Cruyff Legacy Summit.
"You can see the pride in the eyes of the players when they get a chance to sign for Barcelona and that has helped a lot, being able to compete with clubs with bigger budgets and better salaries.
"They wanted to sign for Barcelona, and we are very grateful for these players because, believe me, they had better offers than us.
"And still they chose to follow their dream to be part of history. When you see the eyes shining in these players you know you are in a special place."
LaLiga's strict salary controls meant Barca were forced to wait to register some of their new signings, with Kounde sitting out the club's opening league game as they attempted to streamline their squad.
However, Cruyff believes those who criticised the club's transfer policy lack understanding, adding: "I have noticed 99 per cent of the people don't understand Spanish financial fair play, how to fit that puzzle.
"It is something you won't understand in one hour, it is more complex and complicated. Even when you have money, you can't spend it.
"The news that has come out about us is not always accurate, and I understand people listen to that and think what Barcelona has done is maybe not elegant.
"That is a question of understanding fair play. Our job was to, inside the strict rules of Spanish football, improve the team. Now we have a squad that can compete with everything."
Cruyff also believes Barcelona's purchases were made with the future in mind, adding: "Most of the players we have brought in have a lot of years in front [of them], have a transfer value.
"We have made financially good decisions because you can see in the last week of the window how values have gone up.
"We have a squad for the future. The future is here and the present is here. We have things we need to improve, but the club had to make that decision in the summer.
"January 2022 was not a moment to buy four or five players and repair what we needed to repair. In January we looked at the short term, now we looked at short, middle and long term.
"The team has started really well, with the manager doing a really good job. He has a positive headache... he has a good squad to choose from.
"If that continues the right way, the city is alive again. Even for the smaller games, it's a sell-out and that shows the mood. You see how the people are so happy with the players that have joined. You feel it is alive again, and this club needed that."
UK and Ireland bid for Euro 2028 to be unopposed after Turkey withdraw interest
The UK and Ireland will host Euro 2028, subject to final approval from UEFA’s executive committee next week, after Turkey withdrew its interest.
The five-nation bid is now the only option on the table for the finals in five years’ time after Turkey pulled out of contention for the 2028 finals to focus on a joint bid with Italy for Euro 2032.
UEFA will formally announce the hosts for the two tournaments following a meeting of its executive committee in Switzerland next week.
Paul Warne feels win at Blackpool was best display of his Derby tenure
Paul Warne hailed a 3-1 victory at Blackpool as the best display of his year-long Derby tenure as Korey Smith, James Collins and Martyn Waghorn netted for the visitors.
The Rams have now won four of their five away games so far in League One, with only one victory coming at home.
“It’s the proudest I’ve been and probably the best performance since I’ve been here,” Warne said.
“I think away from home I would like 11 speedsters, that’s what I would like in my team. We don’t have 11 speedsters, we have two or three.
“So sometimes away from home you can play counter-attack, you don’t have to have the ball as much, but you have to be deadly when you have it and we have been.
“Our away form has been good. I think we’ve been pretty good at home but we just haven’t taken our chances but tonight we took harder chances than we’ve been creating at home and we’ve missed.”
After a goalless first half, Smith netted in the 54th minute to move Derby ahead, firing Nathaniel Mendez-Laing’s cutback into the top of the net.
Collins put the Rams further in front on 71 minutes only for Blackpool to hit straight back as Kenny Dougall headed home.
The Seasiders were inches away from an equaliser when the in-form Jordan Rhodes headed against the bar from 10 yards out.
Substitute Tom Barkhuizen restored Derby’s momentum, first seeing an attempt cleared off the line before teeing up Waghorn for a simple finish to ensure the victory.
Blackpool manager Neil Critchley said: “I’m disappointed about the result but not too downbeat.
“I thought it was a really good game, two good teams on the pitch. Derby changed their system, gave us an enormous amount of respect in the way they set up and produced the perfect away performance by defending in numbers and playing us on the break. And they produced moments of real quality.
“We played some really good football, I enjoyed our performance in the second half. Goals change games, we started the second half well but they scored.
“We hit the crossbar at 2-1. If that goes in the game is different.
“They scored when we were on top in the second half. We could have defended that better, but our players have shown spirit.
“We’ll play worse than that and win this season.”
Jude Bellingham helps Real Madrid to victory and Bayern Munich hit back to win
Jude Bellingham’s dream start to life at Real Madrid continued as his mesmerising solo goal helped the Spanish giants down Napoli to make it two wins from two in this season’s Champions League.
Having grabbed a last-gasp winner to see off Union Berlin a fortnight ago, Bellingham first teed up Vinicius Junior to score after Leo Ostigard had put Napoli ahead at the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona.
Bellingham then stole the show as he collected the ball on halfway, drove forward into the area and bulldozed his way through Ostigard before tucking into the corner and although a contentiously-awarded penalty scored by Piotr Zielinski pegged Real back, the visitors won 3-2 following Alex Meret’s own goal.
Victory sent Real top of Group C, where Union Berlin went down to another stoppage-time goal as Andre Castro sealed a 3-2 triumph for Braga, who hit back from 2-0 down to win in the German capital.
Sheraldo Becker’s brace put the hosts in charge but Sikou Niakate and Armindo Bruma drew the Portuguese side level before Castro struck in the fourth minute of time added on to break Union hearts.
Bayern Munich avoided a banana skin after coming from behind to win 2-1 at Copenhagen, with Jamal Musiala and substitute Mathys Tel cancelling out Lukas Lerager’s goal.
The Bundesliga side top Group A, where Manchester United’s stuttering start to the campaign continued after an error-strewn defeat at home to Galatasaray.
Rasmus Hojlund scored a superb second after his opener was cancelled out by Galatasaray’s grinning former United forward Wilfried Zaha, only for Ten Hag’s men to spectacularly unravel.
Kerem Akturkoglu equalised and summer signing Andre Onana’s atrocious pass out straight to Dries Mertens led to a poor Casemiro recovery challenge that saw the Brazil midfielder sent off and a penalty awarded.
The goalkeeper was relieved to see Mauro Icardi strike the spot-kick wide, but he swiftly made amends as United fell to a third Old Trafford loss of the campaign.
It was a forgettable night for Premier League teams as Arsenal lost 2-1 at Lens in Group B. Gabriel Jesus put the Gunners ahead but Adrien Thomasson and Elye Wahi gave Lens all three points.
Jordan Teze’s stoppage-time goal lifted PSV Eindhoven to a 2-2 draw at home to Sevilla, who twice went ahead through Nemanja Gudelj and Youssef En-Nesyri only to be pegged back.
Luuk de Jong’s penalty looked to be vain until Teze popped up in the fifth minute of stoppage time.
Marcus Thuram gave Inter Milan a 1-0 Group D victory over Benfica, while Mikel Oyarzabal and Brais Mendez ushered Real Sociedad to a 2-0 win at Red Bull Salzburg.
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