Luis Enrique

[Raketa10]

We can't control games like we used to and we can't press like we used to. We need to accept that, and do what every team does, that is work hard off the ball to close teams down. We need to improve our off the ball game, even if it means MSN need to stay less advanced and need to actually get involved in helping in defence.

Midfield is good in our team, it's just that it's playing against teams that bring more men in that zone, so it's impossible to control it when you are purely outnumbered. Teams crowd the midfield against us, and that gives them numerical advantage. So everytime we misplace a pass we're left in 3 vs 5 scenarios, because our tactic in possession is not about forming superiority in tight spaces, but exactly the opposite, stretching the play positionally, by having players at long distances between them. Look at this image:

It's actually a 2 vs 5!!! here. Unacceptable. If we plan to play a long team in possession, stretched all over the field, then the pass has to be perfect. What's Busi supposed to do here, he's surrounded by City players FFS!

This style can work. We can move the ball well in a formation that consists of players being farther apart from each other in terms of distance. But if the pass is not good, then that extra distance between our players will kill us, especially when we play against teams that have a different approach and bring more men where the ball is. We have a positional play based on the individual quality of the players now. It's fine, but on an individual level we have to be strong.

The way we play right now, it's a 50-50 game. We can get to teams and score on the counter like we did and could've done more vs City in the first half, or we can make mistakes and concede goals.

Is that Roberto on the ground? Wtf is he doing in this central position at all??? Just look at the gap created after that on the RB position!!!! After that mistake you have 5 on 3 situation!!! If the midfield is crowded that is also where our full backs should step up, they have to strech our play, and Digne and Roberto were yesterday useless in that manner especially in the second half.

To be honest nothing functions in our team right now.

 

[serghei]

Is that Roberto on the ground? Wtf is he doing in this central position at all??? Just look at the gap created after that on the RB position!!!! After that mistake you have 5 on 3 situation!!!

Yea, that's why I said it was really a horrible performance. And note that this is right after the 1-1 goal. Those two blunders could've made us go from 1-0 and dominating heavily, to 1-2 in literally 2 mins.

And it's also about the system, in that, the way we play, there is no safety net in case something like that happens. It's the responsability of every player do not commit such errors. If they do it's not like another players is very close to that zone where the mistake happened and he can get the ball back or make a tactical foul. We play a very wide 3 in midfield, because the wingers don't come down to allow our wide midfielders to go more inside and help the DM more.

 

[kilian]

Messi with his workrate in central midfield. Yeah, that would work.

 

[LeeRomeno]

Im getting sick of the pitchforks out for him every time we lose. Pique and Alba go down through injury, our defense suffers and all of the sudden, Lucho is shit.

Iniesta gets injured, Lucho tries to find the replacement and the midfield starts to struggle, now all of the sudden Lucho is shit.

It's like we have to be über Pep-era, 5-0 golazofests or its the worst this teams been in years and Lucho is an imposter. Like, we aren't the only elite team and everyone automatically bows down before us. It's absurd really.

They were arguably full strength while we have some key injuries. We'd smash them even worse if they didn't have KDB and Otamendi/Stones.

Also, totally different game if Gomes' chance doesn't go off the crossbar. Suarez, Busi, Bob underperforming. It's just a bad spell and it's a good time to have one rather than later on. Last season, without Messi we looked unstoppable. Suarez and Neymar were scoring for fun, we got overconfident and complacent and we slipped.

1st season, we had an unconvincing start and looked like on the verge of utter failure and then we go unbeaten and sweep every title.

Still a lot of season left and honestly this loss could help us down the line this season so people need to get a fucking grip and stop this bullshit every time we don't get a result.

Besides, for me Lucho stays till Xavi is ready as long as we keep La Liga. That simple.

I applaude you!

 

[Raketa10]

After that Roberto mistake our team basically lost their head completely. Up to that moment we had maybe best 40 minutes this season.
It's not normal to lose your head like that especially if you are one of the best teams in the world. I don't know what to say...this is very very worrisome.
I was hoping we will improve but we are actually getting worse. November could be our month of destruction if we continue in this manner especially without Iniesta.

 

[snowy]

Messi with his workrate in central midfield. Yeah, that would work.

He could defo do it. Folks say he's lazy but me thinks he's just good at preserving himself. But ok, here's another option keeping him in RF (my bad):

………………………………….……..Ter…………………………………….………
......................Masch…...............Umtiti…………...............
.........Sergi……………………………………………….………Digne……….

....................................Raki.......................................

.........Rafi or Gomes.............................Neymar.............


…..Messi............................................Arda or D. Suarez


...............................El Vampiro...................................

still liking the previous one better

 

[Horatio]

I'd be up for it to see Neymar play as a midfielder.

 

[snowy]

It would be an Event Horizon

 

[Gaudi]

We can't control games like we used to and we can't press like we used to. We need to accept that, and do what every team does, that is work hard off the ball to close teams down. We need to improve our off the ball game, even if it means MSN need to stay less advanced and need to actually get involved in helping in defence.

Midfield is good in our team, it's just that it's playing against teams that bring more men in that zone, so it's impossible to control it when you are purely outnumbered. Teams crowd the midfield against us, and that gives them numerical advantage. So everytime we misplace a pass we're left in 3 vs 5 scenarios, because our tactic in possession is not about forming superiority in tight spaces, but exactly the opposite, stretching the play positionally, by having players at long distances between them. Look at this image:

It's actually a 2 vs 5!!! here. Unacceptable. If we plan to play a long team in possession, stretched all over the field, then the pass has to be perfect. What's Busi supposed to do here, he's surrounded by City players FFS!

This style can work. We can move the ball well in a formation that consists of players being farther apart from each other in terms of distance. But if the pass is not good, then that extra distance between our players will kill us, especially when we play against teams that have a different approach and bring more men where the ball is. We have a positional play based on the individual quality of the players now. It's fine, but on an individual level we have to be strong.

The way we play right now, it's a 50-50 game. We can get to teams and score on the counter like we did and could've done more vs City in the first half, or we can make mistakes and concede goals.

I know this is only one picture but it exactlay show my point. Look how far our lines are, of course they'll easily bypass our midf. with 3 players and they run towards our back 4. There is no defenders we can buy that would be able for 90 minutes to not concede in this type of situations.

 

[Gaudi]

With all our current injuries, the idea of 2 walls + 1 corrector would be a sound solution. Not sure Busi is up to the task though. Only 2 players left standing with ball control skills, vision, coolness under pressure, defensive skills and aptitude for key passes are Ney and Messi. Thinking out of the box, they could temporarily fill in our ailing midfield, bring back some liaison to our tactics.


.........FB..........CB.........CB...........FB

...........................Raki.............

.........Messi..........................Neymar.......


Rafi or Gomes........................Arda or D. Suarez


........................El Vampiro.............................

This formation could take some serious bite out of the position and provide the traction we need till Iniesta, Busquet, Alba recover.

Busi can do it, he's smart player if only he is not left exposed every time. Of course I don't think our midfielders with Suarez and Ney sholud stand in straight line, that is just for sake of drawing them, that would be stuppid and easily bypassed. No line in modern football should stand straight, always like funnel.

 

[Devils]

Actually there is a lot of overlap between Pep's last season and Lucho's current one so far. both Pep's and Lucho's Barca in 2010/2011 and 2015/2016 were teams that played with machine-like efficiency. But injuries and integration of new players not occurring smoothly have both hindered their plans.

With Pep the season prior we had an incredibly fluid midfield with Xavi/Iniesta/Busi and an brilliant attack in Messo/Villa/Pedro playing a 4-3-3 formation. A lot of the cohesion we had was lost when we tried to integrate Cesc into midfield and Sanchez into attack, trying to force a 3-4-3 system and a career-hindering injury to Villa.

Lucho's Barca is having similar issues, we've had so many injuries this season not to mention signings likes Gomes, Denis and Paco who haven't transitioned into the team as smoothly as the likes of Umititi and Digne have.

It's a mess at the moment, but Lucho still has a lot of time left in the season to fix things. For me, he is a great coach and I think he will find a way through his hard work and dedication to Barca.

 

[snowy]

Busi can do it, he's smart player if only he is not left exposed every time. Of course I don't think our midfielders with Suarez and Ney sholud stand in straight line, that is just for sake of drawing them, that would be stuppid and easily bypassed. No line in modern football should stand straight, always like funnel.

yeah I know you just drew it this way. Busi is smart - he's just been having a bad patch. Suppose he was rested, what do you think of Raki as a stopper/defensive midfielder with Leo & Ney in the right/left midfields?

 

[serghei]

I know this is only one picture but it exactlay show my point. Look how far our lines are, of course they'll easily bypass our midf. with 3 players and they run towards our back 4. There is no defenders we can buy that would be able for 90 minutes to not concede in this type of situations.

Which is exactly the point. People make it sound as if our midfielders are poor players, when they are clearly very good, all of them almost. The problem is the set-up is extremely exposed to individual mistakes, more so than in the past, where our players where so close to each other in the area where the ball was played that a mistake could've been solved by a teammate (let alone taking into consideration that mistakes were fewer because we had numerical advantage and several passing options at each moment). Now not so much, if we make a mistake, we are horribly exposed and easily punished.

Pep's system (because that is the comparison) was much much better at minimizing the damage of a poor pass or a lost ball, because when the ball was lost in midfield, there were constantly 2-3 players at least in it's close proximity, who could get it back fast. Now if the ball is lost, the closest teammate who could help is 20 meters away. In the past our 3 in midfield played closer, so this helped us to both a) pass better and lose the ball less, and b) react better to a lost ball by being in a position to get it back fast (so called 6 second rule). Our setup in midfield was so good in our best days because it was both an attacking weapon and a defending weapon.

That 6 second rule was possible because of the setup in our midfield 3. Now the setup is not as effective at CM because we are exaggerating in trying to exploit the wings.

 

[Gaudi]

yeah I know you just drew it this way. Busi is smart - he's just been having a bad patch. Suppose he was rested, what do you think of Raki as a stopper/defensive midfielder with Leo & Ney in the right/left midfields?

It could work...I think our biggest problem is Lucho's tactic, he needs to sort thing up because team is showing tactical flaws. Then, there is problem with simillar players what [MENTION=20770]Raketa10[/MENTION] is mentioning, Arda, Denis, Rafinha are all some sorts of winger, wide players or something in between. We can fix that even by buying good RB and giving Sergi a chance in midfield. But if our tactics stays the same: no real defending, hoping for last second great tackle and then magic from MSN we are in for a rough season

 

[serghei]

I think the key to this is drop two of the MSN lower and form more of a 4-5-1 against very good teams. Preferably Messi and Neymar have to occupy the wider position, and our 3 midfielders need to play more inside the field than outside.

I'd like a setup like this, positionally

Not like this as it kind of is now:

Basically I want a tighter midfield. And I want two of the MSN to actually help us create superiority in midfield, especially when we see we are being outplayed there. In this way teams won't be able to cut service to MSN anymore, because MSN would be now part of the midfield battle.