It wasnt just that we won the Champions League, though of course that was incredible, it was also that we showed what we have proved on a consistent basis to the doubters, especially after the Chelsea match, that we truly are the real deal.
There are so many people who have said, not as an excuse but just as an observation, Barcelona won because Man Utd were poor on the night. Had Man Utd been good, Barcelona woudlnt have won. Thats not our problem, nor is it particuarly strange. Yes Man Utd were very poor, and of course, naturally they would have caused us far more problems if they had been on their normal form, but biased as its going to sound, I still think we could have matched them on that form.
Our main criticisms came after the two Chelsea matches. "You cant beat an English team, you can only draw, Chelsea showed how to stop Barcelona, Barcelona were ****, Chelsea have the advantage going into the match at Stamford Bridge", that was after the first match. Then came the excuses after the second match, "The referee was terrible, Barcelona had one shot on target, Chelsea deserved to win" I‘ve even heard people say, “You didn’t even beat them, you drew“. No, none of that is true. The referee was consistently bad, he sent off abidal unfairly (though I will go into that in a minute) if we had gone down the other end and had the same case of events as in the Barca penalty area, he likely woudlnt have given it. We wernt bad, at all in that match. We had almost all of the ball possession, Chelsea showed that they were unable to string more than 3 passes together before just lumping it upfield like in rugby .We also showed that we wernt "weak" or to be overpowered by Chelsea, our tired players, unlike Chelsea's, managed to hold together and score late, we kept going, and in referral to a rather brilliant article I read on this forum a while ago, WE played football. If thats how Chelsea play every week then its suprising they have any fans, it was clever, I'm not going to deny that, but ultimately we are the attractive team, they were the ugly team. Would you rather see, any football fans, even if they are English and has huge criticism of Barca after the match, the more attractive footballing team win or the ugly, boring team? Be honest, Barca. And in referral to the last point, yes we beat them, we did not draw, we won on the aggregate, that’s called the Champions League you terrible, terrible losers.
Abidal's sending was a blessing, and it wasnt in disguise either. Not only did Chelsea attack more after that, leaving space behind their 9 man defence, not even exagerrating that figure, 9, but it gave Slyvinho a place in the final. Most people on here know my views on Abidal, I think he's one of the worst Lb's I've ever seen and we need to replace him with anyone else we can find....save from Titus Bramble. Had I been selecting the final squad against Man Utd I would have picked Slyvinho anyway, he's a good player, better than Abidal. We had Puyol and Slyvinho, two less attacking players, meaning more defensive coverage. Dont get me wrong, I'm a HUGE fan of Alves, and of course would have picked him prior to the match, but Puyol was so good at RB, he had that petulant little **** Ronaldo in his back pocket the whole game, he even found time to get forward.
Man Utd played the wrong formation. You cant go 4-3-3 against arguably the masters of 4-3-3. We've been playing it for years, this year arguably better than ever, and it showed. Ferguson almost never gets it wrong, I couldn’t respect him more as a manager, but on this occasion he messed up. I do think though that as much as you can criticise his formation, it was as much down to the players as it was him. The players in their positions were NOT in any kind of position where they would be perceived to be terrible. Rooney was, and is, absolutely wasted in that position on the left, he plays well there yes, but why play arguably, at that point, the best winger in the world up front and the best English striker on the wing? Rooney tracks back yes, but its not fair for Ferguson to waste him like that. It was a huge match for Rooney, who was far more deserving to play in his natural position than Ronaldo was to play there in a match like that. Giggs…I don’t even know what happened to him. He just got it totally wrong, so unlike Giggs, and lent nothing to the game. Our midfield was ALWAYS going to outclass Man Utd’s. I’ve heard so many people say, “We missed Darren Fletcher, what a big miss, we needed him”, LOL. For years he’s been criticised by Man Utd fans for his performances, and even though he’s had a good backend to the season I’ll admit, somehow I find it hard to believe that Darren Fletcher would have been the missing link in Man Utd that could have stopped Iniesta, Xavi and Messi, he would have had to do it on his own anyway, Carrick and Anderson were simply outclassed, unsurprisingly to be honest. Vidic showed once again that he isn’t capable of dealing with quick players like Eto, Torres made him look silly aswell, he’s a world class defender, I wont deny that, but players like that really show up his weaknesses. It was embarrassingly easy for Eto to score that goal. And of course, little Leo. =] How you showed the English perception up. He was like a salmon jumping out of water, everyone who said, “He cant head the ball”, he damn well can, and what a brilliant header it was, and it also showed Ronaldo up too.
At the end of the day, I dont think you can argue with the fact that if Man Utd had played as they normally do, the match probably would have been 50-50. They are the three time English Champions, they won the final last year, their an absolutely fantastic team. Naturally I'm going to swing towards Barca, but without being biased, I just think we've had that something extra, even over teams like Man Utd this year, we've done the treble. What makes our victory in the final so comprehensive, is that it proves we are the best team in the world. If someone like Juventus had won it, it woudlnt be like that. This was a match between the two inarguable best teams this season, without a shadow of a doubt, and we came out on top in that match.
We are the champions, the best team in the world, and we totally deserve it.