Lliga | Round 01: FC Barcelona - Deportivo Alavés S.A.D 3-0

[eaman]

Loved Messi's second. The strenght to stay on his feet and control the ball while been barged in the back was brilliant

 

[KingMessi]

Apart from Pep no one plays entertaining football and wins titles.

Chelsea will look amazing and will keep conceding goals with Sarri which means they won't win the PL.

Defence wins titles, not entertaining football.

... really? Entertaining football and defense are not exclusive.

 

[eaman]

Apart from Pep no one plays entertaining football and wins titles.

Chelsea will look amazing and will keep conceding goals with Sarri which means they won't win the PL.

Defence wins titles, not entertaining football.

I can think of a few others who have done it in the not so distant past. Tito Vilanova, Luis enrique and zidane come to mind

 

[Stoichkov1]

... really? Entertaining football and defense are not exclusive.

No they aren't but it's very difficult to play entertaining football and and at the same time having a good defense.

To play entertaining football generally a team has to press and play with a high defensive line, which means they're open to counter attacks and leave space behind them.

The only team that at the moment plays like that is City, and they don't concede goals because basically they don't let the opposition have the ball.

Our players are too old/not good enough, especially the midfield, to play like that for 90 mins and they will lose control after a while.

 

[BusiTheKing]

I really don't think the type of football we're playing is doing us any favors defensively. First, let's face one thing: when we have players like Rakitic and Busquets in the midfield, we're never going to be a solid defensive unit. Even if our workrate was acceptable, we're simply too ponderous in covering empty spaces in the middle.

Obviously our best shot at minimizing chances against us is to avoid losing the ball. To do that against teams that go all out in pressing, we have to seriously run for each other. Under Valverde, we've failed pretty miserably in that aspect.

Multiple times, we've been outplayed and exposed by ordinary teams in terms of talent. Something that absolutely never happened under Guardiola.

 

[unknowngenius10]

With Pep we played best football since Cruyff and with Valverde it's worst in 15 years.

did u already forget that during Pep's last year we won nothing?
other teams had already figured us out, so we also played crap.

Except for Liverpool, and Maybe City, most teams don't have the players to play such attractive football.

I do believe that a coach like Klopp would get barca back to playing great football though.
whether we would win something under him, well that's another story.

 

[Icarium]

Apart from Pep no one plays entertaining football and wins titles.

Chelsea will look amazing and will keep conceding goals with Sarri which means they won't win the PL.

Defence wins titles, not entertaining football.

Lol. Do you think Real won 3 CL's in a row by playing defensively? Far from it. They looked weak in defense it is their attack that thrashed the opponents.

 

[unknowngenius10]

Lol. Do you think Real won 3 CL's in a row by playing defensively? Far from it. They looked weak in defense it is their attack that thrashed the opponents.

It was actually their bench.
Real Madrid could afford to bring in Isco or Asensio or even Morata as subs.
Barca's bench was crap for the longest time.
When borth Madrid nad Barca mainly relied on their first team, Barca won a lot.
When both tried to reply on their bench, Perez did a great job with having a large, good quality bench.

Now most top teams are starting to have a good bench as well.
I called it a few years ago, but I still don't get why Barca didn't pursue something similar
Also, Madrid was only playing for 1 tournament most of the time

 

[Icarium]

It was actually their bench.
Real Madrid could afford to bring in Isco or Asensio or even Morata as subs.
Barca's bench was crap for the longest time.
When borth Madrid nad Barca mainly relied on their first team, Barca won a lot.
When both tried to reply on their bench, Perez did a great job with having a large, good quality bench.

Now most top teams are starting to have a good bench as well.
I called it a few years ago, but I still don't get why Barca didn't pursue something similar
Also, Madrid was only playing for 1 tournament most of the time

I was talking about the style of football as a reply to outrageous claim. Real also won a league in between. The fatigue killed them last season and got of to a horrible start, after that kind of start there is no coming back. Zidane team was the best in last three years without doubt. He isn't a tactical genius he just created a system where all their attacking players flourish. Yes good bench helps but a system is more important. Valverde is the opposite of Zidane always playing conservative and limiting our players.

 

[LeeRomeno]

Arthur needs to start only in the mind of delusional fanboys. He's a 21 y/o player who just arrived from the Brazilian league and has multiple players ahead of him which are much more experienced and simply better. Seriously, throw him in there and after the rose-colored glasses wear off people are going to sh*t all over him just like with multiple guys before. Developing him slowly is exactly the smart and right choice.

Coutinho on the bench is surprising but not completely inexplicable considering his prominent role during the WC. He'll be starting soon enough. Also, what is the ‘why did for upgrade or midfield then' stuff you're talking about? We certainly didn't upgrade it to be able to win against the likes of Alaves. Or don't you remember how dominant we were last year against smaller clubs, with Rakitic and Sergio? With all due respect, if we don't win today then it's because we were playing crappy football, not because the starters weren't talented or good enough to win.

We improved our depth and we had to replace Iniesta. We didn't buy Arthur or Vidal to be starters out of the gate, nobody in their right mind believed that.

Posts like this are like breath of fresh air.

 

[Raketa10]

I'm not asking for a lot. I'm not even asking for a CL title or demanding a La Liga title or sack.

The only thing I'm asking for is to play entertaining football, faster football, incisive passing and movement with decent pressing. Even fucking Chelsea are starting to implement that even though they're shaky defensively, but it's been just a few weeks for them while over 12 months for us.

You can’t have a decent pressing when you have 2 players in our starting line up who don’t defend at all. With one it’s posssible but with 2 no way it can be done. Also for a faster football you need a faster CF who makes the runs trough the lines and when was the last time Suarez played like that? I am not saying Suarez is the sole problem, I am not even saying he should be benched because we don’t have a substitute for him, I am just saying how things stand right now.

 

[eaman]

I think people should lay off valverde for now. He played an attacking formation last night. We just don't have the players anymore. Remember pep had xavi, iniesta, eto'o henry and alves. Then villa and Pedro. Until semedo and dembele improve we won't improve. Again Messi carried us last night and I'm sure valverde knows that and isn't very satisfied. Ye can start having a go again if he switches to 442. Also the football last night was not very slow and ponderous. It was close enough to peps style bar the chances created which was down to the players

 

[Joan]

[MENTION=22463]Joan Laporta[/MENTION]

It was not a bad match. Barca dominated. Alaves stuck in 451 or 541.
Barca missing sitters. Playing HANDBALL attac style with slow one two passing around

Dembele missed few clear chances, I think he even waisted 2 on 1 counter.

Suarez was desperate miss...

Messi the GOAT. Freekicks are such a beauty to watch from him. Guy is so unlucky with hittin frame. 2 times? Or 3... Can't remember

Coutinho is a magician. He will be a legend.

Slow game. But no need to worry cause chances were created on a regular basis. Just if we had messi on 9.
It would have ended AT LEAST 5:0 as I predicted. Suarez and Dembele were not on fire today.

Thanks.

I just watch the first half and some of the second... it's not the most entertaining stuff ever, but it's not like we're passing not creating.

 

[JerseyAddict]

Thanks.

I just watch the first half and some of the second... it's not the most entertaining stuff ever, but it's not like we're passing not creating.

Exactly. Barça should have scored like 3g in 1st half. So it is not that it was BAAAAAD GAME like people are whinning. It is just that Suarez abf Dembele were not clinical.

Was it slow? Yes. Was it so bad. No. People overreacted again.

 

[LeeRomeno]

First game of the season after difficult summer with some players returning only couple of weeks ago and having no real pre-season vs Alaves, who had like 10 preseason games and no WC players.
3-0 scoreline
Dembele, Semedo both started
No Gomes, no Paulinho, no Denis, no Aleix in lineup
Shots 25-3, majority of them coming from penalty area
Possession 77-23
Complete dominated game and comfortable win compared to barely scraping it last season.
Barcaforum response - whine and cry, season is doomed etc.

I seriously do not understand what kind of standards have some people set for the squad.