Jorge Sampaoli the perfect choice to replace Luis Enrique at Barcelona, says Guillem Balague

Is Sevilla coach Jorge Sampaoli the natural successor to Luis Enrique at Barcelona? 

The Barcelona board have drawn up a shortlist of candidates to replace Luis Enrique should he leave at the end of the season, with Sevilla boss Jorge Sampaoli the ideal man to take over from him, according to Sky Sports’ Spanish football expert Guillem Balague.

The Catalans suffered a 4-0 loss to Paris Saint-Germain in the first leg of their Champions League last-16 clash at the Parc des Princes on Tuesday.

And with the La Liga champions also in real danger of surrendering their title to rivals Real Madrid, who currently lead Barca by a point in the table, but having played two games less, serious questions have been asked about Enrique's future at the club.
"The board have drawn up a shortlist of replacements for Luis Enrique," said Balague. "Nobody has access yet to that shortlist, but it will be the board and nobody else who will choose the future coach of Barcelona.
"Before the PSG game, Luis Enrique was going to be the one to decide if he wanted to renew his contract or not, and Barcelona were happy to keep him. Now the situation has changed, and they realise that there are players who do not think Luis Enrique should stay.
"And the players themselves feel that Luis Enrique will leave and the slight criticism of his tactics after the PSG defeat by Sergio Busquets and Andres Iniesta suggest that the top guys in the team possibly feel Barcelona need a new impulse."

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As well as Sampaoli, Tottenham manager Mauricio Pochettino is also understood to be attracting interest from Barca.
However, Balague feels Pochettino's past connections as captain of Barcelona's city rivals Espanyol will rule him out of the running for the role, and thinks Sampaoli would be the ideal person to replace Enrique.
"Pochettino has got a lot of admirers at the Camp Nou and I cannot see many other managers better than him around, plus he understands what the fans of Barcelona would require and what to do with that team, but he was Espanyol captain and that would make difficult his move to Barcelona," he said. "And he feels he has a job to do at Spurs of course.