Neymar surprised basically no one when he decided to sign with FC Barcelona this summer, and he hadn't really seemed all that likely to sign anywhere else for a few years. Still, it raised some questions about why he chose to go to Barcelona over the mountain of other suitors, a decision which Neymar tried to explain to us today:
"My family spoke to me about joining a club where you could not just win things but where there is stability. I don’t want to play for a club that changes coach every season."'
If managerial stability is important to Neymar, it's hard to argue that Barca wouldn't be a better choice than Chelsea. Then again, I'm not sure that I could be reasonably convinced that Tito Vilanova is going to be at Barca long term, or that he's the type of manager that I'd want to manage me long term either.
There is certainly something to be said for the style Barcelona have played with over the past several seasons, but this season they were a very predictable team without the services of a certain Argentinian hobbit. While I'm obviously biased here, I'd far rather have the opportunity to learn under Jose Mourinho for a season or two than be given a decade to work with Vilanova. Maybe I'm vastly under-rating the Barca boss, but the way they looked without Lionel Messi this season makes me wonder how Viilanova got the job in the first place.