matbezlima
New member
How towards the end of the 2010-2011 season Pep's Barcelona were in danger of collapsing.
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Despite being the season in which Barcelona reached the pinnacle of their football, the 5-0 against Real Madrid being the greatest performance I ever saw and the technical pinnacle of this sport, that season was not without its serious rough moments despite still ending so well.
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Barcelona played fantastic, extra-terrestrial football in that season in almost all games from October to early February, even the 2-1 loss to Arsenal had brilliant football. Their performances from March to April, though, were mostly very lukewarm and off-color, nowhere near their previous level in the season. They recovered their absolute best football only against United in the final.
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What really stands out the most is the series of 4 cl?sicos against Madrid in April and May. Things got very tense and Barcelona's players had lost their previous levels of confidence when facing Real Madrid. They were physically exhausted. Injuries, such as Puyol (Barcelona's defense was far shakier without him), Abidal out with cancer, and lack of rest had started to plague the team since February and caused a significant drop in the level of performance despite still winning almost all games, with some players having to play out of position, such as Busquets as centre-back, Mascherano as DM (which obviously meant that Barcelona lost a lot of their verve and creativity in midfield), Barcelona couldn't play their ideal XI. Look at Barcelona's line-ups in the second leg against Arsenal and in the first leg against Shakhtar. There was also huge mental exhaustion due to the pressure and hype as "best team ever" and Mourinho's constant trash talking really got under Barcelona's players and Guardiola's skin. Pedro and Villa also entered a slump and spent many games without scoring and also lacking confidence, sharpness and precision in their play and the same could be say to a fair degree about Barcelona's play too as a whole in the games.
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Now, let's go in deep detail about the series of 4 cl?sicos. The 1-1 draw in La Liga was not a great performance, too much sterile possession, lacking creativity and precise through balls to break Real's defense, while Mourinho had set up Real very deep and put Pepe as holding midfielder responsible to stop Barcelona's midfield flow, to nullify Xavi and Iniesta. And Pepe excelled in his role. Still, it was a draw that kept Barcelona's 8 point advantage in La Liga and didn't affect much the confidence of Barcelona. But the Copa Del Rey final was another history. Barcelona couldn't get into a stable passing rythm in the first half, Real's big, physical approach was working. Barcelona was unrecognizable and the passing was poor. In the second half, Barcelona was much better. In extra-time, Real won. That brought the confidence of Real's players really high, the trauma and fear of facing Barcelona was gone. Pepe said that Mourinho told his players that "Barcelona are not Robocop, if we really press them, they will make mistakes and we need to take advantage of them".
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Barcelona's players, meanwhile, had lost a good level of self-confidence in their own quality after that loss. The 5-0 seemed a distant game now. It didn't help that what Barcelona would play for was not "only" a place in the UCL final. As Iniesta said in the documentary, winning or not that UCL would be the difference between recognition as an all-time great team, one of the best ever, and as a great team, "but not one of the best".
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Before the first leg at UCL, Barcelona and Real played in La Liga and rested most of their starters. Despite this, Real had a great performance in defeating Valencia 6-3. Meanwhile, Barcelona won 2-0 against Osasuna in an absolutely putrid and ugly match, terrible. For the UCL first leg, Puyol was back, but had to play as full-back because Abidal still was not available. And Iniesta was also injured for the game, a terrible loss. Keita would play in his place. In the match, we had the worst Cl?sico of all. Technically terrible. Real's strategy was sitting very deep, crowd the box and let Barcelona have all the ball. Real was playing for the 0-0 at home! They tried to counter-attack with long balls sometimes, but these long balls were dreadful. Same thing for the set pieces, terrible. I think that Real had only one or two good chances in the game. Meanwhile, Barcelona was not that much better. They had ridiculous amount of possession, but at their own half. Xavi was being man-marked and nullified by Pepe. Messi couldn't see much of the ball. And Barcelona overall approached the game with far more pragmatism and conservatism, they didn't try many of their triangles and typical fast passing, the full-backs, even Alves, stayed in the own half to prevent Real's counter-attacks.
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But the worst aspect of that match was the constant violence and play-acting of both teams. They often seemed to be trying harder to get an adversary sent off than trying to score a goal. It was a physical and scrappy match. S?rgio Ramos provoked a dumb yellow card that suspended him for the second leg. Ultimately, Pepe was sent off in the second half, and he deserved it in my opinion regardless if he touched Alves or not. Messi was decisive and scored two goals, the second one being the greatest UCL goal ever in my opinion. The second leg was a game well controlled by Barcelona and by far the best game technically of the 4 cl?sicos. Barcelona's confidence seemed to be back and some of their interplay in midfield was outstanding. What they lacked was urgency in trying to score, despite a strong spell in the first half that forced Casillas to make many great saves in sequence. Real tried to play proactive football, but Barcelona's technical quality in possession was too much. Real's only shot on target was the goal after Barcelona had scored first.
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Barcelona's players regarded facing and eliminating Real in the UCL's semi-finals as their biggest challenge and triumph of that season. They said that they really won the UCL when they defeated Real, United was not really worrying them, only Real. They were really confident in winning and destroying United, as it happened. UCL 2011 final was the game that fully cemented that Barcelona as one of the best teams ever! They also had a good time of rest before the final and had their full ideal XI, besides Puyol, finally back to action and well.
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They weren't infallible, they were human, but when they were at their peak no team could hope to come close. Their best matches were really something else, the technical level, the dominance and control over the adversaries was so ridiculously high and alien, unlike anything seen before or after, pushing the sport to its highest levels. That's why they gave such an impression of being invincible despite not being, no team is. It's impossible. Despite being eliminated by Sevilla in Copa Del Rey and Inter in UCL, Barcelona was still clearly the best team in Europe in the 2009-2010 season, with only 4 defeats. And April 2012 was the first time they suffered two defeats in a row since Guardiola assumed. The only flaw that they had was maybe that they were so used to destroy adversaries and so much faith and confidence in their philosophy that they could be seriously shaken and nervous in the rare times that they weren't at their best and unable to penetrate a tough defense. Nervousness could really consume them as a snow-ball in these matches. They were still human after all.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Despite being the season in which Barcelona reached the pinnacle of their football, the 5-0 against Real Madrid being the greatest performance I ever saw and the technical pinnacle of this sport, that season was not without its serious rough moments despite still ending so well.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Barcelona played fantastic, extra-terrestrial football in that season in almost all games from October to early February, even the 2-1 loss to Arsenal had brilliant football. Their performances from March to April, though, were mostly very lukewarm and off-color, nowhere near their previous level in the season. They recovered their absolute best football only against United in the final.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What really stands out the most is the series of 4 cl?sicos against Madrid in April and May. Things got very tense and Barcelona's players had lost their previous levels of confidence when facing Real Madrid. They were physically exhausted. Injuries, such as Puyol (Barcelona's defense was far shakier without him), Abidal out with cancer, and lack of rest had started to plague the team since February and caused a significant drop in the level of performance despite still winning almost all games, with some players having to play out of position, such as Busquets as centre-back, Mascherano as DM (which obviously meant that Barcelona lost a lot of their verve and creativity in midfield), Barcelona couldn't play their ideal XI. Look at Barcelona's line-ups in the second leg against Arsenal and in the first leg against Shakhtar. There was also huge mental exhaustion due to the pressure and hype as "best team ever" and Mourinho's constant trash talking really got under Barcelona's players and Guardiola's skin. Pedro and Villa also entered a slump and spent many games without scoring and also lacking confidence, sharpness and precision in their play and the same could be say to a fair degree about Barcelona's play too as a whole in the games.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Now, let's go in deep detail about the series of 4 cl?sicos. The 1-1 draw in La Liga was not a great performance, too much sterile possession, lacking creativity and precise through balls to break Real's defense, while Mourinho had set up Real very deep and put Pepe as holding midfielder responsible to stop Barcelona's midfield flow, to nullify Xavi and Iniesta. And Pepe excelled in his role. Still, it was a draw that kept Barcelona's 8 point advantage in La Liga and didn't affect much the confidence of Barcelona. But the Copa Del Rey final was another history. Barcelona couldn't get into a stable passing rythm in the first half, Real's big, physical approach was working. Barcelona was unrecognizable and the passing was poor. In the second half, Barcelona was much better. In extra-time, Real won. That brought the confidence of Real's players really high, the trauma and fear of facing Barcelona was gone. Pepe said that Mourinho told his players that "Barcelona are not Robocop, if we really press them, they will make mistakes and we need to take advantage of them".
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Barcelona's players, meanwhile, had lost a good level of self-confidence in their own quality after that loss. The 5-0 seemed a distant game now. It didn't help that what Barcelona would play for was not "only" a place in the UCL final. As Iniesta said in the documentary, winning or not that UCL would be the difference between recognition as an all-time great team, one of the best ever, and as a great team, "but not one of the best".
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Before the first leg at UCL, Barcelona and Real played in La Liga and rested most of their starters. Despite this, Real had a great performance in defeating Valencia 6-3. Meanwhile, Barcelona won 2-0 against Osasuna in an absolutely putrid and ugly match, terrible. For the UCL first leg, Puyol was back, but had to play as full-back because Abidal still was not available. And Iniesta was also injured for the game, a terrible loss. Keita would play in his place. In the match, we had the worst Cl?sico of all. Technically terrible. Real's strategy was sitting very deep, crowd the box and let Barcelona have all the ball. Real was playing for the 0-0 at home! They tried to counter-attack with long balls sometimes, but these long balls were dreadful. Same thing for the set pieces, terrible. I think that Real had only one or two good chances in the game. Meanwhile, Barcelona was not that much better. They had ridiculous amount of possession, but at their own half. Xavi was being man-marked and nullified by Pepe. Messi couldn't see much of the ball. And Barcelona overall approached the game with far more pragmatism and conservatism, they didn't try many of their triangles and typical fast passing, the full-backs, even Alves, stayed in the own half to prevent Real's counter-attacks.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
But the worst aspect of that match was the constant violence and play-acting of both teams. They often seemed to be trying harder to get an adversary sent off than trying to score a goal. It was a physical and scrappy match. S?rgio Ramos provoked a dumb yellow card that suspended him for the second leg. Ultimately, Pepe was sent off in the second half, and he deserved it in my opinion regardless if he touched Alves or not. Messi was decisive and scored two goals, the second one being the greatest UCL goal ever in my opinion. The second leg was a game well controlled by Barcelona and by far the best game technically of the 4 cl?sicos. Barcelona's confidence seemed to be back and some of their interplay in midfield was outstanding. What they lacked was urgency in trying to score, despite a strong spell in the first half that forced Casillas to make many great saves in sequence. Real tried to play proactive football, but Barcelona's technical quality in possession was too much. Real's only shot on target was the goal after Barcelona had scored first.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Barcelona's players regarded facing and eliminating Real in the UCL's semi-finals as their biggest challenge and triumph of that season. They said that they really won the UCL when they defeated Real, United was not really worrying them, only Real. They were really confident in winning and destroying United, as it happened. UCL 2011 final was the game that fully cemented that Barcelona as one of the best teams ever! They also had a good time of rest before the final and had their full ideal XI, besides Puyol, finally back to action and well.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
They weren't infallible, they were human, but when they were at their peak no team could hope to come close. Their best matches were really something else, the technical level, the dominance and control over the adversaries was so ridiculously high and alien, unlike anything seen before or after, pushing the sport to its highest levels. That's why they gave such an impression of being invincible despite not being, no team is. It's impossible. Despite being eliminated by Sevilla in Copa Del Rey and Inter in UCL, Barcelona was still clearly the best team in Europe in the 2009-2010 season, with only 4 defeats. And April 2012 was the first time they suffered two defeats in a row since Guardiola assumed. The only flaw that they had was maybe that they were so used to destroy adversaries and so much faith and confidence in their philosophy that they could be seriously shaken and nervous in the rare times that they weren't at their best and unable to penetrate a tough defense. Nervousness could really consume them as a snow-ball in these matches. They were still human after all.
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