Oriol Romeu’s dip in form: Cause for concern at Barcelona?

After what looked to be a scintillating start to life at Barcelona, doubts have started sprouting up about Oriol Romeu.

The departure of one Sergio Busquets left an unfillable void in the Catalans’ midfield, and the hole was deepened by the club’s financial constraints when going after a replacement.

Dreams of Marcelo Brozovic, Martin Zubimendi and even Joshua Kimmich were floating around, but quashed swiftly by the reality of their accounts.

Oriol Romeu – a homegrown player sharing a good dynamic with Xavi – was available virtually for free, and thus, was a no-brainer for Barcelona who just could not afford to head into the 23/24 campaign without a pivot.

After his arrival, he looked wonderful in preseason, showing the power and defensive stability he added to the Catalans’ playing style and also displaying an array of passes that not many thought he had in his locker.

Barcelona’s injury woes have an impact

Unfortunately for the Spaniard who also started the official season well, injuries to Pedri and De Jong have made life very difficult, and things are only getting worse with Raphinha and Robert Lewandowski also being sidelined.

Barcelona have struggled to maintain control of the ball, break defensive lines, and create too many clear-cut chances since their star midfield pairing got injured.

And Romeu’s shortcomings on the ball as one of the primary distributors has since been exposed, after he was previously content to shore up the midfield defensively, which allowed de Jong to express himself more and add attacking threat.

As such, Romeu’s two games since the Celta Vigo game have been shaky to say the least, with his outing against Porto being particularly poor.

The 31-year-old lost possession 11 times, which is far too much for a pivot, and especially in the Champions League, where Barcelona’s individual errors have cost them dearly in the past few seasons.

Does Xavi need reinforcements?

Xavi did seem to notice Romeu’s lack of confidence and the lack of support from someone more comfortable on the ball and after he moved Ilkay Gundogan back and slightly closer to the Spaniard, things seemed to improve slightly.

This does pose the question of whether Barcelona need to look at options in the winter transfer window.

But once again, the main issue is finances, and add to that a lack of options in the market and the answer becomes quite clear that any moves are out of the question, as Vitor Roque is also arriving in January.

There were always going to be shortcomings in Romeu’s game given his lack of experience at a level like the Champions League, and because of his age, but the Catalans will have to continue putting faith in him.

Xavi needs to ensure that he has support from a skilled on-ball player beside him and allow Romeu to do what he does best.

With the international break coming up, Barcelona will also be hoping that de Jong and Pedri make significant progress in their recoveries which can allow Romeu to regain his rhythm when club action returns.