Pedri Faces Criticism Amid Barcelona's Struggles
Barcelona turn the page quickly when the blows land hard. A Champions League exit at the hands of Paris Saint-Germain, a painful defeat to Real Madrid at the Spotify Camp Nou, and suddenly the mood around the club has darkened again. The focus now is on the trip to Deportivo Alavés and Quique Sánchez Flores, but one name refuses to leave the debate: Pedri.
Pedri in the firing line
According to Sport, the young midfielder has absorbed some of the sharpest criticism in the wake of those two defeats, with Cadena COPE’s Manolo Lama leading the discussion. For Lama, the issue is not talent. It’s legs.
"To be a top-class player, you have to be at the peak of your physical level," he argued, making Pedri’s condition the centre of his case. Lama insisted he has detected a clear physical problem and linked it directly to a drop in the midfielder’s trademark precision.
When the body dips, the passes follow. That was his message. "When he suffers from a physical problem, his passing is not as accurate as it was before," Lama said, tying Barcelona’s stuttering rhythm to the player who once set their tempo.
Then came the harshest line. Lama described a footballer running on fumes, claiming Pedri "looks tired after the first ten minutes of the match", a damning assessment for a player who built his reputation on constant involvement and clarity in tight spaces. If the legs go early, the final stages become a slog, and that, in Lama’s view, explains the lack of energy late in games.
When fatigue blurs the mind
Lama went on to draw a wider picture, bringing Pablo Barrios into the conversation as a reference point for sharpness in La Liga. The comparison was less about status and more about sensations: how freshness changes everything.
"When feelings of fatigue build up in a player, he loses his energy, and your mind no longer works at the same speed as your legs move, something that shows clearly on you," he said. The criticism cut to the core of Pedri’s game. His football is built on timing, angles, and reading situations a fraction earlier than everyone else. If the mind and body fall out of sync, the whole package suffers.
At that moment, Juanma Castaño, presenter of El Partidazo on Cadena COPE, stepped in with a reminder: this is not the first time Pedri’s status has been questioned. He recalled that the midfielder had already lost his starting place during the World Cup, a sign that even on the international stage, his place is not guaranteed.
Club reality vs national-team doubts
Castaño, though, drew a clear line between Spain and Barcelona. For him, the dynamics at club level are different. He does not see the same scenario unfolding at the Camp Nou, arguing that Pedri usually delivers when he wears the Barça shirt. In other words, doubts around his role with the national team do not automatically translate into doubts about his importance in Catalonia.
That nuance matters. Inside Barcelona, Pedri is still viewed as a pillar of the project, even if the outside noise grows louder with each poor result.
The Bernardo Silva factor
Journalist Miguel Rico then closed the debate with a specific diagnosis of what went wrong against Real Madrid. For him, Pedri’s problem in that game had "a name and a surname": Bernardo Silva.
Rico highlighted the Portuguese midfielder’s experience and his ability to rise when the situation demands it, describing him as "that player who has great experience and is strong when the situation demands it, as well as being a top-class footballer." Against that level of control and maturity, Pedri struggled to impose himself.
Barcelona now head to Vitoria needing a response, their young playmaker under the microscope, and a simple question hanging over him: can he find his physical edge in time to carry this team through the season’s most demanding stretch?
