Barcelona slammed after 4-0 embarrassment at PSG, Luis Enrique will go in the summer and Lionel Messi's contract needs sorting out more than ever... is this end of an era?

The inquest into Barcelona’s 4-0 defeat in Paris agreed on one thing – this was not a team losing a football match so much as a club losing its way. ‘This is not Barca’ headlined Diario Sport over the image of Marc-Andre ter Stegen and Gerard Pique dumped on the Parc des Princes turf by one of PSG’s four goals.

Only the goalkeeper, Jordi Alba and Neymar were given any sort of mark in Diario AS’s ratings as everyone had the finger of blame pointed at them – some more than others.

‘Whoever put a Ballon d’Or clause in Andre Gomes’ contract when he signed for the club deserves an honorary degree,’ quipped one comment piece. He had probably been the worst of a bad bunch but most roads in ‘Blamesville’ led to Luis Enrique’s door – he had after all agreed Gomes’ £30m acquisition last summer and picked him in the biggest game of the season. And according to the majority he is the one who has betrayed Barcelona’s sacred playing style.

Barcelona players look dejected as they slumped to a 4-0 defeat in Paris

Lionel Messi and Neymar hold and inquest during the 4-0 drubbing by PSG

Messi looks dejected at the final whistle as he sits on the pitch after the 4-0 defeat 

AS said the coach had signed his own death warrant with a performance completely devoid of any trace of Barcelona’s philosophy. That warrant will not be served until the end of the season but save a miraculous turnaround in the second leg – which no one believes in – it will most definitely be served.

No club’s supporters care more about the aforementioned ‘style and philosophy’ of the team than Barcelona’s and for a long time now there have been whispers that both had been completely lost under Enrique.

It did not help Enrique’s cause that he was so out-thought by fellow Spanish coach Unai Emery who until Tuesday night had a terrible record against Barcelona with only one win in 23 attempts at various clubs. He set up his team to attack their weakness and stop the supply line to their strengths and it worked with devastating effect.

Sport said the performance carried the ‘stink of the end of an era’. It remains to be seen if that turns out to be a gross over-exaggeration. If the era in question is the one marked by Enrique then it certainly will end when in the summer he is replaced by Sevilla’s Jorge Samapoli or Athletic Bilbao’s Ernesto Valverde. But it is Messi not the manager who really marks this era and he will still be at the club next season.

It’s now more important than ever for the Barca board that he is not in the last year of his contract when the new season kicks off. After the almost inevitable Champions League elimination in three weeks time, Barcelona will be more obliged than ever to write a blank cheque to keep him.

The future of Lionel Messi remains unclear as he enters the final year of his contract next term

Paris Saint-Germain's Angel di Maria consoles Messi as he walks off at the end of the game