When Barcelona signed Robert Lewandowski in the summer of 2022, it raised plenty of questions.<\/p>\n
The Catalans were bringing in a 33-year-old striker who was arguably past his prime on a four-year deal. They paid Bayern Munich an initial \u20ac45million ($52m; \u00a339m) for the Poland international at a time of financial strife, despite the veteran only having a year left on his deal.<\/p>\n
Lewandowski had won almost everything there was to win. He had been the Bundesliga\u2019s top scorer for seven years in a row and only Gerd Muller had scored more than his 344 goals in a Bayern shirt<\/a>. But there were no shortage of people in football who saw Lewandowski\u2019s move to Barca as one last paycheck in a glittering career.<\/p>\n Four years later, the 37-year-old is leaving Barcelona as one of the best strikers in their modern history.<\/p>\n There is a case to be made that he is behind other legendary forwards such as Luis Suarez and Samuel Eto\u2019o because of a lack of European silverware. But Lewandowski has done something special. He arrived when Barca were lost and did not know where they were headed. Today, as he wrote in his farewell Instagram post, \u201cBarca is back where it belongs\u201d.<\/p>\n In his four seasons in Spain, Lewandowski has won three La Liga titles \u2014 more than Cristiano Ronaldo during his nine campaigns at Real Madrid. You can add a Copa del Rey and three Supercopas de Espana to that trophy collection.<\/p>\n Then there is his ridiculous goal return<\/a>: 119 goals in 191 games, putting him in Barca\u2019s top 15 scorers of all time, along with 24 assists.<\/p>\n \n Robert Lewandowski has scored at a ruthless rate for Barcelona (Alex Caparros\/Getty Images)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n There is a lot to praise about his character given the challenge he accepted. Lewandowski joined the year after Barca had lost their all-time top scorer Lionel Messi to Paris Saint-Germain on a free transfer. The club had navigated a difficult 2021-22 season in which even qualifying for the Champions League was seen as a success.<\/p>\n Club president Joan Laporta believed Barca lacked a marketable star, a franchise player who the club could pin their hopes on \u2014 on the pitch but commercially, too. Laporta explored the market and, as soon as he realised Lewandowski was a possibility, did not hesitate.<\/p>\n He was unveiled in Barcelona in August 2022. More than 57,000 fans attended the event at the Camp Nou, the kind of expectation only star signings of the past such as Ronaldinho and Thierry Henry generated.<\/p>\n It did not take long for him to make an impact \u2014 Barca won La Liga in his debut season, in which Lewandowski was the top scorer with 23 goals. A run of 13 goals in his first 12 league games set the tone and ensured his side won silverware for the first time since Messi\u2019s exit.<\/p>\n
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