Barcelona have officially confirmed the transfer of Douglas from Sao Paulo for 4 million euros and a further 1.5 million depending on future appearances. The 24-year-old right back signed his five-year contract on Friday after playing 170 games at the Brazilian Serie A, scoring 10 goals.
- Report: Brazilian defender Douglas joins Barcelona
- Report: Zubizarreta targeting more deals
- Ledwith: Barca can expect to progress in UCL
Club sources, understandably, have been quick to highlight his strengths: Confident to play the ball with both feet, eager to join attack whenever possible, defending well when under pressure, able to find open teammates from the back line ... On paper, sporting director Andoni Zubizarreta really made him sound like a better version of Cafu or, closer to home, the next Dani Alves.
Unfortunately, many Cules have also been bombarded with a wave of negative comments from a number of Brazilian football experts who simply can't understand how Barcelona could be interested in a player who has never featured for his senior national team despite his 24 years of age. If he is the fantastic player that Zubizarreta wants us all to believe he is, one would have expected him to be preferred to Alves (31 years old), Maicon (33) or Danilo (23) by now.
In reading the reaction of Sao Paulo fans, Douglas was often the object of scorn from his own fans due to his clumsy defending and concentration lapses when tracking back into position -- exactly the same two factors that Alves has been criticised for in recent years. I would be delighted to be proved wrong on this point, but I seriously doubt a defender who failed to win fans over at Sao Paulo has any chance of making a lasting impression at the Camp Nou.
Personally, I simply don't understand how signing a player who will be a third-choice right back (behind Alves after his refusal to leave the club and an improving Martin Montoya) can make any sense from a sporting point of view. Investing in Douglas during a transfer window when Juan Cuadrado was also clearly open to a transfer after a memorable showing for Colombia at the World Cup is ridiculous, and even more so when we consider that Barca won't be able to sign anyone else until January 2016.
The Barcelona directors have admitted that Brazilian sport marking agency Traffic has netted its share of the transfer fee, as it owned 40 percent of Douglas' rights. Those who have been following Barcelona for a number of years may remember how former president Joan Laporta agreed to pay a combined 24 million euros for the transfer of Henrique Adriano Buss and Keirrison de Souza back in 2009.
Similarly to the current Douglas situation, Cules didn't quite understand the reasons behind the club's controversial decision at the time. The result? Neither Brazilian ever played a game for Barca and both were released after failing to impress while on loan at clubs such as Racing Santander, Bayer Leverkusen and Fiorentina. They were both owned by Traffic -- a suspicious coincidence, to say the least.
Don't get me wrong, I would be ecstatic if Douglas were capable of putting all the above behind him and becoming a regular starter under manager Luis Enrique. However, there aren't many reasons to believe that will actually be the case at this point.
Having said all of the above, the undeniable truth is that the deal has already been completed and all the fans can do is move on from the disappointment caused by the signing. Constant complaining simply won't make any positive difference to either the player himself or the team as a whole. At this point, the only way forward is sticking by the squad that the directors have built and looking forward -- at least until club members are given the chance to vote for a new board.
Regrettably, the next Barca election is currently scheduled for August 2016 and current president Josep Maria Bartomeu has no intention of bringing it forward despite the ongoing criticism he continues to face on a daily basis. Personally, I just can't understand how someone who was not voted as president in the first place feels entitled to dictate the club's future for over two years, but then again, maybe that's just me not realising the kind of world we live in nowadays.
Let's hope that the Barca members make the right decision once they are finally given the chance to choose their club's future -- whatever the final outcome may be.
As for Douglas, I sincerely hope he can prove doubters wrong and become the player that Zubizarreta is so desperately trying to make us all believe he is.
The Quote: "We have been following him since 2012 because this is an important position for us. This was the right time to sign him because of the possibilities we'll have for signing players in the future. We looked at the option of loaning him out after we bought him, but after checking with Luis Enrique we decided that the best place for him to adapt to European football would be right here. We want to create a situation of competition on a day-to-day basis from which the coach will pick his team for every game. There is no such thing as a first XI and substitutes if there is competition for places among a squad." - Zubizarreta.