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At the beginning of the season, many believed that Real Madrid would be champions. They didn't trust Barcelona as they were. Many people were wrong about that. Flick has done very well since he arrived.
They said Lewandowski was no longer in his prime, he was old. But he came out and scored goals almost every game. Barca almost let Raphinha go, but Flick trusted him and made him the most important part of the team. Pedri, Ferran, Fermin, they all improved. Yamal plays as if he's been a professional football player for years. They really wrote a great success story this year.
This deserves some merit. If I had to mention the most important reason for Barcelona's rise this season, I could have just copied your post. The reason is that I myself said that I believe Lewandowski is beyond his peak. He might be beyond it indeed, but if someone is still good enough to keep up with Mbappe and scores 40 goals in La Liga, CL, Copa del Rey and Supercopa combined, I think that is a great way to describe someone as being past his peak.
What impressed me the most was when Lewandowski was injured, the team did not suffer from it. They have all these options. The young strikers, Olmo as a midfielder who can take over part of what Lewandowski's job is, it's frightening how versatile the team is and how they can go back and forth between players and formations and still maintain their brilliance.
Yamal is just a joke. I became a football fan because of the great times La Liga had starting about two decades ago. I got somewhat disinterested when Barcelona's best team more or less dissolved a few years ago, but now Yamal is the true bestseller again. Times are back when you have to repeat the highlights when he scores one of these impossible goals. Without injuries and with the right people surrounding him, he has the potential to become the best player in the world multiple times throughout his career. What's so fantastic about it is what he has in common with Messi, both don't look like the perfect athletes at all. I thought Yamal is going to be attacked more this season, suffer from more injuries, start diving more and complaining more, but no. He relies on what he is capable of doing in the game. A dream coming true for a teenager.