Barcelona's Starting XI Under Hansi Flick Takes Shape
Hansi Flick did not need a press conference soundbite to make his point after Barcelona edged Al Ahly 2-1 in the Joan Gamper Trophy. His team sheet did the talking. So did his substitutions.
With La Liga kicking off on Sunday against Elche, the outline of his first competitive XI is already there, sketched across a summer of friendlies and fitness tests rather than drawn from a full-strength squad.
Several big names are still short of their best physical level, and that reality has pushed Flick toward a more pragmatic approach: reward the players who have been on the pitch, not the ones on the treatment table.
The Gamper only underlined that.
A spine takes shape
The clearest clues are at the back and in midfield.
In goal, Joan Garcia looks nailed on to continue. Flick has leaned on him consistently through pre-season, and there has been no sign of a late twist in that position.
Ahead of him, Eric Garcia has quietly become the frontrunner at right-back. Used there repeatedly, he now looks less like a stopgap and more like Flick’s chosen solution for Elche.
Gerard Martin has also climbed the internal hierarchy. His steady pre-season, coupled with Flick’s repeated trust, points to him starting in central defence, with Andreas Christensen the man most likely to stand alongside him.
On the left, the Gamper brought a key moment: Alejandro Balde’s return. Just getting minutes was significant; doing so with Elche around the corner makes it entirely plausible he goes straight back in as the starting left-back.
If the back line has taken shape, midfield looks even more settled.
Marc Bernal has been the constant. Flick has used him as the central anchor, the fixed point around which everything else moves. On either side, Xavi Espart and Fermin Lopez have emerged as the preferred partners, the duo most often trusted to complete the trio.
Across the summer, that combination has looked less like an experiment and more like a plan. Right now, it is one of the strongest candidates to start on Sunday.
All of this means Barcelona’s first league XI under Flick could look very different from the “ideal” team fans picture once everyone is fully fit. But with conditioning still dictating choices, the coach appears ready to back those who have been present, consistent and reliable through July and August.
Raphinha fixed, Gordon the wildcard
Up front, the questions pile up.
One thing is clear: Raphinha is in. Flick has treated him as a certainty on the flank, and nothing in the Gamper hinted at a change.
The opposite side is more open. Karim Adeyemi has the advantage of volume – regular minutes, steady involvement, a clear role in Flick’s pre-season plans. Lamine Yamal, though, carries a different kind of weight. His quality makes him impossible to ignore, even if he has not played as often.
The real intrigue sits in the middle.
Hamza Abdelkarim has been Flick’s go-to centre-forward throughout the friendlies, the most frequently used No. 9. On paper, that should make him favourite to start against Elche.
But then came the Gamper twist.
When Hamza went off against Al Ahly, Flick did not turn to another orthodox striker. He slid Anthony Gordon into the central role. A winger by trade, repositioned as the reference point through the middle.
That change may have been the night’s biggest clue.
Flick has spent much of pre-season probing for different solutions at No. 9. The decision to move Gordon inside in a showcase match like the Joan Gamper Trophy suggests he is not just an emergency option, but a genuine candidate to lead the line on Sunday.
It does not automatically push Hamza out of the picture. His minutes and usage still matter. But that single substitution showed something important: Flick is prepared to treat Gordon as a central weapon when the situation demands it.
With Elche looming and fitness still clouding the ideal XI, those small hints – a full-back repurposed, a youngster trusted in midfield, a winger nudged into the No. 9 role – might be exactly what define Flick’s first real statement as Barcelona coach.
