Luis Enrique announces he is leaving Barcelona

Athletic Bilbao manager Ernesto Valverde and Sevilla’s Jorge Sampaoli are now seen by the Barcelona hierarchy as the best possible candidates to replace Enrique, The Independent has been told.

“I want to thank club for their confidence, and the players for their dedication and professionalism”. “It’s been a hard, but well thought through decision, I need to rest”. Later they decided I would be the coach for these three years, which for me will be unforgettable.

“We accept Luis Enrique’s decision”, Barcelona president Josep Bartomeu confirmed.

Boss Luis Enrique continued his experiment with a 3-4-3 formation in an attempt to rediscover the Catalans’ top form after their thrashing in Paris. He has been a great coach.

The Spaniard has led the club to back-to-back league and Copa del Rey crowns, as well as the 2014-15 Champions League. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to www.theeagleonline.com.ng as the source.

The former Galatasaray star has participated in first team training this week and has overcome his muscle injury. Jordi Alba, Javier Mascherano, Ivan Rakitic and Denis Suarez all come into the side this evening. “The football in the last three years has been incredible”, the Manchester City manager said. “There are three exciting months ahead”.

“The important thing is that we face up to the remaining games we have left”. “We do not have to speculate any more and now we must focus on the future”.

Candidates will probably include Sevilla’s Jorge Sampaoli, Everton’s Ronald Koeman and former PSG manager and Barca player Laurent Blanc.

“We didn’t know he was going to announce it today”, the Croatian admitted. Having captured the Europa League a year ago, the Argentinian has overseen a remarkable run of form this season which sees the La Liga outfit flying high both in Europe and domestically.

A win for Real Madrid over Las Palmas would see Barcelona return to second place in the league with Zinedine Zidane’s side still in possession of a game in hand.