{"id":73654,"date":"2026-08-21T09:39:15","date_gmt":"2026-08-21T09:39:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/73654\/"},"modified":"2026-08-21T09:39:15","modified_gmt":"2026-08-21T09:39:15","slug":"hansi-flick-has-decided-where-karim-adeyemi-fits-in-barcelonas-attack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/73654\/","title":{"rendered":"Hansi Flick has decided where Karim Adeyemi fits in Barcelona’s attack"},"content":{"rendered":"

Karim Adeyemi can play through the middle. His career record shows that clearly.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Yet after several weeks of pre-season under Hansi Flick, one detail has stood out: the manager has not once turned to the German as his striker.<\/p>\n

That appears to be a deliberate choice.<\/p>\n

With Barcelona still searching for a new centre-forward, Flick has used the club\u2019s friendly matches to test several solutions in the No. 9 role.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Five players, two from the academy, have been given opportunities there, but Adeyemi has been absent from that list every time.<\/p>\n

According to SPORT<\/a>, the German coach sees Adeyemi as a winger and, unless Barcelona are left with no other option, does not intend to use him as the central reference in attack.<\/p>\n

Five striker experiments reveal Flick\u2019s plan for Adeyemi<\/p>\n

Barcelona\u2019s pre-season has offered several clues about how Flick wants to set up his attack.<\/p>\n

\"KarimAdeyemi will not play centrally under Flick. (Photo by Daniela Porcelli\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

The search for a striker remains active, particularly with the club still looking for a top-level solution to lead the line.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Flick himself acknowledged<\/a> after the Gamper Trophy that Barcelona \u201care looking for\u201d a centre-forward, while also making clear that he has complete faith in Deco\u2019s work.<\/p>\n

Until a new signing arrives, however, the coach has had to work with the players already available.<\/p>\n

During the four pre-season matches, Flick experimented with five different options in the striker position.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Hamza Abdulkarim, Raphinha and Anthony Gordon were among the senior team players used through the middle, while two from the academy were utilised as well.<\/p>\n

Adeyemi, despite having experience as a centre-forward, was not given the same opportunity because Flick wants to use his pace, direct running and ability to attack space from the wing rather than placing him between opposition centre-backs.<\/p>\n

Barcelona\u2019s striker search keeps Adeyemi out wide<\/p>\n

Barcelona\u2019s interest in signing a centre-forward<\/a> is another important part of Flick\u2019s thinking.<\/p>\n

\"KarimAdeyemi will only play on the wings. (Photo by Daniela Porcelli\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

If Adeyemi were viewed as a long-term solution in the middle, the club\u2019s need to bring in another striker would not be quite so obvious. Instead, Barcelona\u2019s sporting department continues to explore the market for a specialist forward.<\/p>\n

That leaves Flick with several alternatives for Sunday\u2019s La Liga opener against Elche.<\/p>\n

Dani Olmo has experience operating as a false No. 9, while Fermin Lopez has also shown a willingness to play further forward.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Raphinha and Anthony Gordon have been tested in central areas during pre-season as well.<\/p>\n

All of those options have been considered before Adeyemi, who has primarily operated on the right wing, the same side where Lamine Yamal would normally feature in Barcelona\u2019s strongest XI.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He has also received minutes on the left, but the right flank appears to be the position Flick has in mind for him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Karim Adeyemi can play through the middle. His career record shows that clearly.\u00a0 Yet after several weeks of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":73293,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[92,222,223,930,22504],"class_list":["post-73654","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-barcelona","tag-barcelona","tag-barcelona-news","tag-fc-barcelona","tag-hansi-flick","tag-karim-adeyemi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73654","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73654"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73654\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73293"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73654"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73654"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73654"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}