Barcelona have confirmed that Sergi Barjuan will take charge of first-team activities as the club search for a new manager, after relieving Ronald Koeman of his duties on Wednesday.
Barjuan, the man who has been appointed to look after first-team affairs, for now, is Barça B’s current manager. His contract with the B team runs until June 2022.
The 49-year-old was a left-back for Johan Cruyff’s ‘Dream Team’ at Barcelona. In the 1993/94 season, Barjuan won a La Liga title and reached the European Cup final with Barça.
The current caretaker boss represented Spain 58 times as a player and after a decade with the La Liga giants, he joined Atlético Madrid for three years before retiring in 2005.
Barjuan has previously coached at the club’s academy, La Masia, managing Barça’s Juvenil B youth team between 2009 and 2011, before going on to manage Recreativo Huelva in the 2012/13 and 2013/14 seasons.
He then went on to have a 6-month spell at Almería in 2015, before coaching Mallorca for two months in 2017. In the same year, Barjuan joined Chinese outfit Zhejiang Greentown as manager until 2019.
The new interim coach’s position as first-team head coach will end as soon as Barça have hired a replacement for Koeman, according to an official club statement released on Thursday.
At the very least, Sergi Barjuan will be in charge of Barcelona’s home game against Alavés on Saturday, and it remains to be seen whether he will also be in charge of next Tuesday’s Champions League Group E clash against Dynamo Kyiv in Ukraine.
Current Al Sadd head coach and former Barcelona captain, Xavi Hernández, is expected to take over at Camp Nou.
