Too early for so much pleasure?

It is not just the ten consecutive victories, it is also the exuberance of the football that Barça plays. The first year of Hansi Flick's project has begun with a forcefulness that justifies all the praise. Right now, Lamine Yamal and company are candidates for everything. A squad that has the future Ballon d'Or winner and is packed with world champions must aspire to every title by design – and almost by obligation – but putting it into practice every three days is a massive challenge. And this team does it, without flaws, with a coach who pushes them and receives the appropriate response. The changes made in the summer, both in terms of signings and departures as well as the work at the Ciutat Esportiva –hello, Benjamin Kugel–, have been the right ones to increase the level and make dreaming of the Champions League stop being, at last, a utopia.

Flick smiles when we ask him what he thinks about the fact that rivals see them as the team that plays the best football in the world, but although he is proud of it, he also exhibits his long-term vision: the one that reminds us that everything can change very quickly, that we are only in the month of October and that when you have to be unstoppable is in the spring. He knows, better than anyone, that an untimely injury, an expulsion, an unfair refereeing decision, or a bad night of bad luck can knock you off the path. But he also knows, better than anyone, that seeking excellence constantly and in all the pieces of the machinery he leads brings you much closer to the goal and minimizes the risks of what you cannot control. In this context, everything that did not work last season helps a lot as a lesson, because everyone has thorns in their side and redemptions to make. This is key.

The calendar has given us an exciting stretch of matches that is not decisive but will indeed give clues as to the solidity of the foundations of what is to come at the end of the season. In this case, the test on Tuesday in Paris will be especially interesting: a rehearsal of a hypothetical Champions League final, a test bench of what is already being done well and what needs to be perfected. If Barça dominates and wins at the Parc des Princes it will be great news, but the most normal thing would be to see more seams than usual as part of the learning process: it will be in the knockout stages where one will really have to be infallible. We all know that more difficult moments will come, but no one will take these weeks of joy and excitement away from us now. It is very early, but this Barça is starting to promise us that the real pleasure is yet to come.