Barcelona spent more than 400 million euro trying to replace Neymar, and yet the starting lineup had only Luis Suárez and Lionel Messi as Barcelona drew 2-2 a critical match against Atlético Madrid, playing with no other forward alongside. It’s as if Neymar left, and no one took his place.
Antoine Griezmann, bought for €120 million, was on the bench until injury time. Martin Braithwaite, bought for the relatively paltry sum of €5 million, was an unused sub. Ousmane Dembélé (€105 million) is still out injured, which has become the norm for him.