The endless stories and speculation about Ronaldinho in the last few weeks got me thinking of how the press treated Louis Van Gaal in his first term at Barça, and basically how the press is capable of turning the public against someone.

When Barça signed Van Gaal in the summer of 1997 he was most people’s choice to take Barça back to the top. He had won the European Cup in 1995 with an exciting young team at Ajax, beating the Milan team that had humilliated Barça the year before, and fresh in the memory was a footballing lesson that Ajax had given Real Madrid in the Bernabeu in the 95/96 season.

In his first season at Barça he won the league and cup double, and followed that up with another league title the next season. Barça played attacking football and Van Gaal got the best from the likes of Rivaldo, Kluivert, Figo, Luis Enrique and Cocu. In his third season he took Barça to the semi-final of the Champions League, but long before this the crowd had turned against him. How could this be so?

When Van Gaal arrived one of his first decisions he made was to limit press access to the players, presumably he wanted the players to be concentrated on their game. This was something the press didn’t like as they need to find stories every day to sell their papers. Van Gaal also showed his abrasive character in many press conferences, he was a man who would not suffer fools easily and he often showed his disdain for stupid questions. The press responded with a campaign against him which I could only descibe as pathetic. First, they ridiculed his Spanish accent even though he made a much greater effort to learn the language than his predecessor Bobby Robson. Then they picked on the fact that he took notes during the game, as if this was somehow a negative thing!

The campaign went on and on, and the public began to buy it. I remember arguing with people at the time that it was not necessary for a football coach to be a nice guy (although I genuinely believe Van Gaal was an extremely honest and decent human being). It seems some of the players eventually turned against him too, perhaps they didn’t like his sergeant-major style. Anyway, by the time they lost to Valencia in the Champions League semi-final in 2000 the crowd were completely against him. Seeing the reaction of the Camp Nou crowd that night, one might have thought the team had just been relegated. It wasn’t long before president Nuñez and Van Gaal were gone, bringing in the glorious Gaspart years. I will always remember the press and public treatment of Louis Van Gaal as probably the saddest episode in my time supporting Barça.

So, what has this got to do with Ronaldinho? I admit there are many differences between the two cases. But there are similarities in the on-going campaigns. Yes, Van Gaal was arrogant and rubbed people the wrong way, and yes, Ronaldinho likes a party. What worries me is that in the end the public are turning against the Brazilian, this in turn makes him unhappy and it seems his confidence could be affected. Could the press be destroying a great player as they destroyed Van Gaal?