CL semis: Bayern - Barca 3-2 (3-5 agg.)

[Hamzah]

What the flipping actual fuck????

Just read that now on Spiegel Online. So apparently Benatia limped out of the stadium yesterday night with his right leg heavily bandaged. If Benatia is out too, then we really might as well throw the towel. If Dante starts, Jeesus fuck. I will not be able to watch the slaughter. I don't deserve this.

Did all your old fitness guys get fired or something? This is crazy.

 

[Ryu Hayabusa]

Man, this is not even funny anymore, no matter whose side one is on...
Maybe Pep rushes them back too early? There must be some kind of explanation for this misery.

 

[Icarium]

There is no "definite" here.

Technically speaking how can they lose? If everything turns out well they score a goal (that is the meaning of everything going according to plan)... and if they don't commit mistake then they don't concede.

I did not mean they will win against us if both teams played at their best. In order to lose we need to have a bad game, same can't be said about bayern. At least in the first leg. They might not be doing anything wrong but still be 1 or 2 goals behind by the end of 90 mins. The power of MSN is such. Without robben and ribery and possibly lewa they won't be the same team in attack (if they sit back they can defend better and limit us to a draw at camp nou)

 

[FCBayern]

A 2-0 result is beyond excellent. It almost ends the tie from the first game. We score one in Bavaria and they are done and dusted.

The 2-3 defeat vs City had Bayern play with 10 men, so we should not ascribe too much weight on that.

But overall, Bayern have not done well against good teams this season. Both in Germany and in Europe. We have been awesome against more and more formidable opponents, no two ways about it. This is the reason why I consider us as favorites.

But football always carries a heavy element of randomness. We can play awesome and fail to score (Celta or City at home, two games we should have scored a grand total of at least 10 goals in, we only scored one) and have Bayern score a Diego/Essien-esque lucky golazo and leave us leaking our wounds in the end.

Bayern may also manage to raise their game for this one, significantly. If they play like that have in big games this season, they are going down, and they are going down ugly, unless they get City/Celta levels of luck on their side.

So, I would say we are definitely favorites, but Bayern are nothing to be sniffed at and the element of luck is always there as well. So, we shall see.

HAHA good one, so either we get lucky or it's over, right? And what exactly are the big games that Bayern played badly this season, apart from Porto away? You also realize that Bayern hammered everyone and reached all its objectives so far with 7 injuries for most of the season. well counting out the german cup yesterday, which I don't care it's the injuries that made that game frustrating. which team in the world can do that if you remove half of the crucial players? It's enough to take Messi out from you, or Ronaldo from Real, etc. And the group wasn't easy at all, despite Bayern made it look a walk in the park. Still I do believe you are favorites but not for the reasons you mention.

 

[Richard.H]

Yeah, i don't know how they see it as being arrogant or underestimating bayern side... We should be wary of threat bayern pose in alianz arena that is why we need to finish the tie in the home leg. Settling for 1-0 or 2-1 might not be a great thing, it is not the end of the world but it will be complicated. The fact that there is chance for bayern will motivate them even more.

Anyway stop praising your opponents too much. I hope barca doesn't give too much respect for bayern, they should be ruthless.

If we don't win at Camp Nou by a margin of 3 or more goals, I will seriously be worried for the return leg. Bayern are a different beast at Allianz

 

[Hamzah]

Man, this is not even funny anymore, no matter whose side one is on...
Maybe Pep rushes them back too early? There must be some kind of explanation for this misery.

Robben came back early for sure.

 

[Barcaman]

Might be where the conflict has it's roots, who knows.

Put yourself in Pep's shoes and suddenly you see dilemmas all over the place:

Lowering the intensity in training preserves health, on the other hand it's a basic requirement to internalize playing sequences in an intense playstyle. And it's required to somehow keep a healthy level of stress in the team, especially when Bayern seemingly is about to win the league in late November, metaphorically speaking.

Then you have players who are essential to what the coach wants the team to play. Fielding these players though every match might guarentee short term success, but the injury risk is unproportionally increased. Yet not fielding them or resting them might get them out of playing rhythm and leads to them falling into discontent with the man management. Coupled with the fact that one of these essential players, Robben, is known to be a glass cannon.

The same goes basically for the general tactical setup, it requires permanent compromise between what the coach knows works, and player fatigue and injury risk. And as a consequence, the question arises whether the coach should abandon a tactical setup he knows is perfect because it might be too physically draining for the players. Extreme example here is Bielsa, who basically leads players far beyond their physical possibilities with the idea in his mind to play it perfect. And to be honest, Pep is not that far off of Bielsa's ideas at all.
All these conflicting ideas result in borderline absurd situations like the Thiago - Robben sub yesterday, which for me illustrates perfectly what happens when it all goes wrong. Basically the idea was to sacrifice control in midfield and increasing the speed of transition while preserving Thiago for the Barca tie. All the while changing the tactical setup. Yet the end result is having Thiago not on the pitch to take a penalty, losing the tie and Robben in the hospital.

Point being: The condition in which both teams find themselves in at the moment is the result of made decisions and not chance or accident. Simply a matter of causality.
In delimitation of what Pep did and did not do, Lucho took a different approach: Constant rotation and shuffling the lineup was a huge gamble; the team played sub-par till at least December, Lucho got a lot of flak for it and I wouldn't be surprised if our management was already looking to replace him by summer. He took a huge risk, even individually regarding his future career, and it paid off: At this point, Barca is firing on all cylinders. And that is what I reckon to be an achievement in itself. Which is why I don't think that the current injury situation would in any way belittle a Barca victory over Bayern at this point.

Nice post Denny. I'd also like to think current injury status is not down to luck (entirely).

 

[footyfan]

I think people expecting/hoping for a high win in the first leg is precisely because they are wary of facing Bayern at the Allianz.

At least that's how I view it. I would also be pleased with a 2-0 victory. But Bayern's demolition of Porto is fresh in my mind.

I really wish we played the first leg away.

Anyways, as long as we don't go crazy we should be fine.

A lovely scenario would be:

Win 2-0 in the first leg.
Score first in the second leg.

By that stage I'd be breathing easy.

Thank you. Exactly this. Barca will have to take full advantage in the first leg when Bayern will be depleted and away from home.

 

[StarLord]

HAHA good one, so either we get lucky or it's over, right? And what exactly are the big games that Bayern played badly this season, apart from Porto away? You also realize that Bayern hammered everyone and reached all its objectives so far with 7 injuries for most of the season. well counting out the german cup yesterday, which I don't care it's the injuries that made that game frustrating. which team in the world can do that if you remove half of the crucial players? It's enough to take Messi out from you, or Ronaldo from Real, etc. And the group wasn't easy at all, despite Bayern made it look a walk in the park. Still I do believe you are favorites but not for the reasons you mention.

Porto is not really a big game. It's a somewhat difficult game at best.

Man City, PSG, Atletico and Real Madrid are big games. You have not faced anything in that quality bracket except Man City in the GS which resulted to a narrow 1-0 win in the 90th minute from a deflected strike.

We completely owned PSG and Man City in a manner far more convincing to yours. Just watch our home game vs City as well as yours and make the comparison.

Any decent side, and you have badly struggled this season. Dortmund, M'Gladbach, Wolfsburg and Schalke. You struggled or drew/lost all of those games. You got beat by Porto and turned them around when they were missing their best players as well. You drew away to Shaktar, you needed a penaldo to beat CSKA etc etc etc.

Compare that to our big game (plus difficult game) record this season. You are miles back. Like I said, you either deliver a performance like you have not delivered before this season (or last for that matter) or you get very lucky, or you get eliminated.

 

[Luftstalag14]

I am immensely worried about Bayern scoring in the first leg. If they just put one behind Ter Stegen, what do we do? We need to score 3?

 

[StarLord]

I am immensely worried about Bayern scoring in the first leg. If they just put one behind Ter Stegen, what do we do? We need to score 3?

Even if it's a draw at the Camp Nou, we can still beat them on their patch. We are not Porto, nor 10-man Shaktar.

 

[Luftstalag14]

Porto is not really a big game. It's a somewhat difficult game at best.

Man City, PSG, Atletico and Real Madrid are big games. You have not faced anything in that quality bracket except Man City in the GS which resulted to a narrow 1-0 win in the 90th minute from a deflected strike.

We completely owned PSG and Man City in a manner far more convincing to yours. Just watch our home game vs City as well as yours and make the comparison.

Any decent side, and you have badly struggled this season. Dortmund, M'Gladbach, Wolfsburg and Schalke. You struggled or drew/lost all of those games. You got beat by Porto and turned them around when they were missing their best players as well. You drew away to Shaktar, you needed a penaldo to beat CSKA etc etc etc.

Compare that to our big game (plus difficult game) record this season. You are miles back. Like I said, you either deliver a performance like you have not delivered before this season (or last for that matter) or you get very lucky, or you get eliminated.

They did beat City and slaughtered Roma at their CL group stage, right?

 

[Luftstalag14]

Even if it's a draw at the Camp Nou, we can still beat them on their patch. We are not Porto, nor 10-man Shaktar.

Scoring at the Allianz against them is tough.

 

[Luftstalag14]

What the flipping actual fuck????

Just read that now on Spiegel Online. So apparently Benatia limped out of the stadium yesterday night with his right leg heavily bandaged. If Benatia is out too, then we really might as well throw the towel. If Dante starts, Jeesus fuck. I will not be able to watch the slaughter. I don't deserve this.

Could be just mind games. Today at a store in Barcelona I was chatting with a clerk about our upcoming games and Lewandowski's injury, that Catalan clerk pointed to his head, shrugged it off and said "Well, Guardiola does these kind of things".

 

[Ryu Hayabusa]

Might be where the conflict has it's roots, who knows.

Put yourself in Pep's shoes and suddenly you see dilemmas all over the place:

Lowering the intensity in training preserves health, on the other hand it's a basic requirement to internalize playing sequences in an intense playstyle. And it's required to somehow keep a healthy level of stress in the team, especially when Bayern seemingly is about to win the league in late November, metaphorically speaking.

Then you have players who are essential to what the coach wants the team to play. Fielding these players though every match might guarentee short term success, but the injury risk is unproportionally increased. Yet not fielding them or resting them might get them out of playing rhythm and leads to them falling into discontent with the man management. Coupled with the fact that one of these essential players, Robben, is known to be a glass cannon.

The same goes basically for the general tactical setup, it requires permanent compromise between what the coach knows works, and player fatigue and injury risk. And as a consequence, the question arises whether the coach should abandon a tactical setup he knows is perfect because it might be too physically draining for the players. Extreme example here is Bielsa, who basically leads players far beyond their physical possibilities with the idea in his mind to play it perfect. And to be honest, Pep is not that far off of Bielsa's ideas at all.
All these conflicting ideas result in borderline absurd situations like the Thiago - Robben sub yesterday, which for me illustrates perfectly what happens when it all goes wrong. Basically the idea was to sacrifice control in midfield and increasing the speed of transition while preserving Thiago for the Barca tie. All the while changing the tactical setup. Yet the end result is having Thiago not on the pitch to take a penalty, losing the tie and Robben in the hospital.

Point being: The condition in which both teams find themselves in at the moment is the result of made decisions and not chance or accident. Simply a matter of causality.
In delimitation of what Pep did and did not do, Lucho took a different approach: Constant rotation and shuffling the lineup was a huge gamble; the team played sub-par till at least December, Lucho got a lot of flak for it and I wouldn't be surprised if our management was already looking to replace him by summer. He took a huge risk, even individually regarding his future career, and it paid off: At this point, Barca is firing on all cylinders. And that is what I reckon to be an achievement in itself. Which is why I don't think that the current injury situation would in any way belittle a Barca victory over Bayern at this point.

Good post. Had almost overlooked it if it weren't for Bojan.
Well, Jupp was also far from being a fan of implementing rotation, they also must have had high intensity in their training sessions as we both know that he created the most insane pressing machine the world of football has seen in the past 10 years. That requires tons of training and as much intensity as the player's bodies can be squeezed for. But other than Kroos, Bayern really didn't have any noteworthy injuries for a long time in their juggernaut season.
So while your thoughts seem perfectly logical, it also raises the question whether Jupp just got luck-of-the-Irish style lucky in that season or not.