We do play more like a team but it's far from Cruyff's philosophy as the author suggest. We are neither playing good football nor developing for the future.
Luftstalag14
Culé de Celestial Empire
To me that article is a pathetic effort of Sport's to whitewash our subpar performance. How are we a team again? Simply because we value possession again? "they've lost their directness, but at the same time the ball is theirs again", how can this be good? I don't think we have conceded possession to the point of that it was no longer part of our game under any manager recently, so where is the debate? The problem is we doesn't do much with our possession. At the the end of the day we are judged by the result of the game and how many chances we created, not by % of possession. This reminds me of when people came out to defend Guardiola's Bayern after they lost games but had much bigger possession %, they said they "tactically won". 
To me having the directness (a Plan B) is good, not bad at all.
Magala, the bottom of the table was a test and EV overcame it? Haha, Sport has really low standards then.
To me having the directness (a Plan B) is good, not bad at all. Magala, the bottom of the table was a test and EV overcame it? Haha, Sport has really low standards then.
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xXKonan
Senior Member
It actually reminds me a bit of Van Gaal's United. Sterile possession and defensively better but our creation and individual quality went down the drain and we are relying a lot on Messi unfortunately. But I don't think it needs to be like this however.
The System he's using the 4-4-2 at times feels so constrained and it's even worse when you have the likes of Rakitic and Roberto at RB and a off form Suarez. Rakitic cannot create or control the tempo at all and he struggles when he's pressed. and not only that this current version of Rakitic makes it even worse.
Roberto works well when he has better options on the right side of the field but when he's partnered up with Rakitic, everything dies on that right hand side with no progress whatsoever. You seen that last couple of times when Denis,Paulinho etc came on and played and yesterday when Roberto was pushed back into the Mid things looked better.
I know this window was full of drama and Dembele got injured but Valverde needs to take off the chains and trust more and play Paulinho,Denis,Roberto in the Midfield and don't be afraid of benching the likes of Rakitic, Pique and Suarez etc.
The System he's using the 4-4-2 at times feels so constrained and it's even worse when you have the likes of Rakitic and Roberto at RB and a off form Suarez. Rakitic cannot create or control the tempo at all and he struggles when he's pressed. and not only that this current version of Rakitic makes it even worse.
Roberto works well when he has better options on the right side of the field but when he's partnered up with Rakitic, everything dies on that right hand side with no progress whatsoever. You seen that last couple of times when Denis,Paulinho etc came on and played and yesterday when Roberto was pushed back into the Mid things looked better.
I know this window was full of drama and Dembele got injured but Valverde needs to take off the chains and trust more and play Paulinho,Denis,Roberto in the Midfield and don't be afraid of benching the likes of Rakitic, Pique and Suarez etc.
Barcilliant
Senior Member
Just wait until the shit hits the fan and we go into a nosedive.
Suarez, Pique and Rakitic should be benched. Iniesta should be used sparingly. Semedo should be our starter at right back and Roberto our starter in midfield. We also need to give Busquets a bit of a break now and then. Every manager seems to run Busquets into the ground. He's usually exhausted by March.
Yes, the results are there but they are papering over the cracks. Valverde is another Yes man appointed by the board.
Suarez, Pique and Rakitic should be benched. Iniesta should be used sparingly. Semedo should be our starter at right back and Roberto our starter in midfield. We also need to give Busquets a bit of a break now and then. Every manager seems to run Busquets into the ground. He's usually exhausted by March.
Yes, the results are there but they are papering over the cracks. Valverde is another Yes man appointed by the board.
khaled_a_d
Senior Member
To At the the end of the day we are judged by the result of the game and how many chances we created, not by % of possession. This reminds me of when people came out to defend Guardiola's Bayern after they lost games but had much bigger possession %, they said they "tactically won".
And so far EV has delivered in that regard, so why we complain about him?
Anyway, I think it was a badly written article mainly because it said little. Like it could have been said in 3 sentences.
henias
New member
And so far EV has delivered in that regard, so why we complain about him?
Anyway, I think it was a badly written article mainly because it said little. Like it could have been said in 3 sentences.
Bcos we are hardly tested. Juventus is one and Atletico is another, and against Atletico, u alr seen how glaring some of our problems are. Lucho's problem also didnt surfaced until they faced a big team like PSG and Juventus in the CL. So u cant exactly say Valverde is doing "well", and the way of him handling things isnt exactly the best. Our concerns are definitely not over exaggerated or unnecessary; time will tell especially when ur best players get worn off, and these problems are likely to surface in late stages.
Also, it seems like Messi has been the only good source of goals which is not looking very promising.
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Ghostmaster
Danger Ahead
People are forgetting how horrible we were last season. We weren't horrible just against PSG or Juve, we were struggling against minnows, midfield had one task - to bring the ball to MSN and they couldn't even do that sometimes, Pique and Umtiti were passing to each other because they didn't now what to do, Roberto was exhausted and couldn't run anymore in the second half of the season. Lucho was playing Gomes, Mathieu and Arda even we were losing points because of their mistakes. And he was rotating players like crazy(remember Alaves loss?), sometimes even before international break(remember loss against Celta?). The team has definitely improved from last season and Valverde has learned a lot of lessons from Lucho's mistakes.
Horatio
You're welcome
I bet after the Bilbao, Sevilla, Valencia, Celta game people will still argue we are to be tested.
Messi983
Senior Member
Didn't really see those problems you're talking about against Atletico. We were a better team all game except for the first 10-15 minutes. And even there we had a chance in 1st minute which could turn the game totally other way if Messi would score. To be fair, maybe it would be a harder game for us if he'd score because Atletico would pressure more instead of just sitting back defending their lead but we can only speculate how the game would go on and what final result would be in that case.
About the opponents: you can only play against teams that are on your schedule. It's true we've had a relatively easy fixture so far but we've done what was expected and probably even better resultwise. I'm pretty sure we would drop points against Getafe and maybe in some other games we've won so far last season so I see this as an improvement. I'm a firm believer that league titles are won (and even more lost) in those type of games so as long as we'll win those games I'm ok if we occasionally drop points in tougher away games like Atletico, Athletic, Sevilla or Villarreal because Madrid will do the same.
It's true better opponents will come over the next 2 months and we'll see how EV and the team will react but from what I've seen so far I'm not concerned because they've stepped up whenever that was needed. And it wasn't only about Messi saving our asses all the time. He's had some pretty quiet games recently (at least for his high standards) and we've won regardless. Bench players have made an impact in many games and I believe EV at least deserves some credit for that.
George_Costanza
Active member
Take Messi out of this team and Barca would have probably earned only 3 to 6 points out of 25 points. So for result oriented fans, Messi has delivered not EV. If we have won due to tactical master plan then I would give some credit to EV.
Alik
Moderator
We won all CdR matches, naturally, and all the big matches in the league. We struggled against lower table opposition in large part due to combined mass rotations, for which Lucho was rightfully criticized.
khaled_a_d
Senior Member
Few things:
-I don't think we were really that bad of a team last year, we had some awful games (Juve & PSG) and Lucho made stupid rotations but we lost like 8 points out of last 21 games IIRC. but we reached a point that we were tactically inept and lost motivation. that needed to stop and Lucho knew he wasn't the guy to do it and stepped out of the way.
-We took a step back rather than a step forward this summer, we lost our second best player, got a young prospect in Dembele who got injured (and I doubt he will be anything close to Neymar anytime soon btw,kid has long way to go) and we didn't address many of our problems, in fact we remained reactive rather than proactive and didn't foresee the drop in Suarez & Pique form. Never mind failing to get rid of unwanted players like Vermaelen and Arda
As for EV:
-Our form leaves a lot to be desired, I think that is a fact so far. We aren't dominant or the team that everyone fear. he has been over using the likes of Rakitic & Iniesta, might argue that Suarez,Messi(with his age, he will need to start resting sooner or later) & Pique too.
-That said, there is also many positive stuff :
1-Bringing Messi back as false 9 has stopped making Messi a tactical problem himself and made us having a right side again, Suarez isn't a LW but he stays more on the left side than Messi did before on the RW which keep the opponent LB occupied and left things open for Alba
2-There is overall more balance within the team , and even with Pique shit form we are better on the defense
3-The team has been also improving from inside, S.Roberto is in better shape,Denis is doing better, even Gomes isn't as shit as last year if we are gonna be fair
4-All of our four new players are adding something new to the team, Gerard is giving us a true quick winger, Paulinho giving us a true b2b midfielder ,Semedo is a natural RB who is solid in defense and Dembele give us creativity. That can't be said in any of our transfer market since 2013 (because we only bought Neymar) and I think EV has a role in that.
-There is also some other debatable issues,not using youth (I think he was in no position to give Alena playing time up till now) or giving Semedo more time (but you can argue Roberto hss been really solid) etc
So overall I think it is a bit too early to make a final conclusion, EV is surely bringing something tactically to the team, but he also doesn't bring excitement
-I don't think we were really that bad of a team last year, we had some awful games (Juve & PSG) and Lucho made stupid rotations but we lost like 8 points out of last 21 games IIRC. but we reached a point that we were tactically inept and lost motivation. that needed to stop and Lucho knew he wasn't the guy to do it and stepped out of the way.
-We took a step back rather than a step forward this summer, we lost our second best player, got a young prospect in Dembele who got injured (and I doubt he will be anything close to Neymar anytime soon btw,kid has long way to go) and we didn't address many of our problems, in fact we remained reactive rather than proactive and didn't foresee the drop in Suarez & Pique form. Never mind failing to get rid of unwanted players like Vermaelen and Arda
As for EV:
-Our form leaves a lot to be desired, I think that is a fact so far. We aren't dominant or the team that everyone fear. he has been over using the likes of Rakitic & Iniesta, might argue that Suarez,Messi(with his age, he will need to start resting sooner or later) & Pique too.
-That said, there is also many positive stuff :
1-Bringing Messi back as false 9 has stopped making Messi a tactical problem himself and made us having a right side again, Suarez isn't a LW but he stays more on the left side than Messi did before on the RW which keep the opponent LB occupied and left things open for Alba
2-There is overall more balance within the team , and even with Pique shit form we are better on the defense
3-The team has been also improving from inside, S.Roberto is in better shape,Denis is doing better, even Gomes isn't as shit as last year if we are gonna be fair
4-All of our four new players are adding something new to the team, Gerard is giving us a true quick winger, Paulinho giving us a true b2b midfielder ,Semedo is a natural RB who is solid in defense and Dembele give us creativity. That can't be said in any of our transfer market since 2013 (because we only bought Neymar) and I think EV has a role in that.
-There is also some other debatable issues,not using youth (I think he was in no position to give Alena playing time up till now) or giving Semedo more time (but you can argue Roberto hss been really solid) etc
So overall I think it is a bit too early to make a final conclusion, EV is surely bringing something tactically to the team, but he also doesn't bring excitement
Devils
Senior Member
Comes off as a guy who completely lacks balls to take the team forward.
The guy is still reliant on Lucho's ideas and doesn't seem confident or capable of developing his own ideas/system.
For the life of me I cannot understand why he plays Rakitic every game or still insists playing Roberto at RB. The only way it makes sense is that he realizes it worked for Lucho so he's sticking to it.
We could have a much more functional and stronger team by further integrating Semedo at RB and Paulinho/Roberto/Denis in midfield and then finally adding Dembouz to the team in a few months. But it looks like he will just ride out Lucho's favorites until reality comes crashing down.
The guy is still reliant on Lucho's ideas and doesn't seem confident or capable of developing his own ideas/system.
For the life of me I cannot understand why he plays Rakitic every game or still insists playing Roberto at RB. The only way it makes sense is that he realizes it worked for Lucho so he's sticking to it.
We could have a much more functional and stronger team by further integrating Semedo at RB and Paulinho/Roberto/Denis in midfield and then finally adding Dembouz to the team in a few months. But it looks like he will just ride out Lucho's favorites until reality comes crashing down.
Ghostmaster
Danger Ahead
Rakitic should have been replaced the day Alves left because he worked only in Lucho's setup where Alves was basically a midfielder and Rakitic was covering for him. It's Robert's fault really for keeping him here that long, now EV is stuck with him. I am sure that he thought about playing Roberto, Paulinho or even Gomes in his position, but he probably thinks that they are too attack minded and will be leaving their zone trying score goals and others will have to cover for them. And remember what happened when we played Las Palmas with Paulinho, Denis and Busi, midfield was overrun. Rakitic should be replaced, but I don't think we have right player in our squad right now. It could be that Valverde wanted to bring Seri, but last moment realized that he might be worse defensively than Rakitic.
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