After two very poor seasons and with an economic climate that doesn't allow for major investments, Barça's basketball team needs to reinvent itself. The big problem is that the Blaugrana club can't compete with the large European budgets, but neither can it imitate the strategy it implemented in football, when cash constraints served to accentuate the focus on young players. The new international landscape allows American universities to offer contracts that the club can't afford. This causes promising young players to leave for the United States at an increasingly early age. The departures of Kasparas Jakucionis and Dame Sarr will be emulated by Mathieu Grujicic and Raúl Villar.

Getting the basketball section back on track is the first big challenge for Xavier O'Callaghan, who was appointed Barça's new director of professional sports a few weeks ago. The former handball player, a man who has Joan Laporta's full confidence, adds the coordination of sporting decisions to the management side that he already controlled. "When the president asks you to do something, you can't say no. I had no doubts," he acknowledged a few days ago in an interview on TV Vandellòs.