Penal Madrid

serghei

Senior Member
Also, it doesn't help that we're racking up big titles as well. So the players might actually still feel like winners, and downplay the CL results in recent times. They could be in a state like, 'meh, it's just bad luck for some years. Look at the record in Spain, we're still the top dogs, but we're just unlucky. After all, we're spaking Madrid regularly'. That could be true in some parts, but still doesn't help resolving the issue.

We're not addressing the problems, but are masking them, partly because we're still winning (just not in one specific competition) and partly because there's nobody critical in the team. The manager is a pretty timid dude, quiet and not too brave. He's certainly not the guy to go against the flow here. He'll carry on being the same and trying to do his best, while not shaking things up too much. His speech after losses consists of praising the other team and basically saying, that's football and at this level there's no poor teams. Stuff like that. He doesn't actually give any signals that the team has been terrible and that these games can't happen at this level. And trust me, it's not a case of being the good guy in public, and being very critical in private. That's just who he is. He is a manager, not a leader. It's like teachers at school. Some give you the lesson, leave, and don't really care about anything else. Some are more, and end up being people that guide you and help you in more ways, not just strictly in school related stuff. When you're trying to rebuild a team, it surely helps to have a manager that is not as much a tactical instructor, than more a leader who really shapes the team in more ways than one.
 

serghei

Senior Member
[MENTION=16942]BBZ8800[/MENTION], I'll tell you why I don't think Barca's style has been figured out.

It's because no team shut down Barca from creating chances during Pep. The losses we had were us individually not scoring from clear chances, or having bad refereeing hurt us big time. So, Pep's Barcelona hasn't been figured out at all during his time. No team ever won 3/3 League titles, and 2/3 CLs in 3 years, with a sextuple and a double included. That kind of domination was unprecedented and still is.

You say Mourinho on Camp Nou with Inter.

First Mourinho's team didn't even walk into our 16m box in that game. Actually, it was a bad idea from Pep that he didn't sub Valdes with a striker :lol:. So, we had to score 2 goals against a team cramped into their own 30m. And we actually did do it in the end, only a good goal was disallowed for nothing except an imaginary hand ball. Also, I think Iniesta didn't even play in that game and we had Ibrahimovic who was uselss in comparison with Eto'o, so this wasn't even peak Barcelona, and still should have made it through with some decent finishing. And we had to attack with Bojan, who missed 2 great chances in that game.

Then you give the Chelsea example, where it was bad luck at its best. It would've been as simple as Messi scoring from a penalty and we would've went through. Chelsea had 3 shots on target and scored 3 goals almost in the two ties. Barca had at least 10 clear chances that they missed.

Your example of why Barca football has been found out is based on nothing but isolated games in which there were a lot more factors involved. The style, exactly like Pep said, is meant to give players a way to arrive in clear scoring positions. From then on, the players have to score the clear chances. Which they did not do on those nights. Or when they did, some stupid ass refs took wrong decisions.

Barca's style can't be found out because there was no secret or no gimmicks involved. You had to defend for dear life, and use all time wasting tactics in the book (will never forget Inter time wasting in the first 10 mins on Camp Nou :lol:), and hope Barca were in a poor shooting day and you were as clinical as it gets. Which happened a few times.

Barca+final+third.JPG


It was no style failure in that game, no Chelsea finding out how to block us. it was a match in which a team survived a non-stop siege with the motherload of luck.

You give examples in 2010 and 2012, but actually the best performance against Barcelona was by Hiddink's Chelsea in 2009. Even more proof that with some luck you can win games in which you were dominated, while sometimes you lose games in which you dominated your opponent in gruesome fashions. It's the nature of Cup competitions built on such thin margins, that just about any factor, however small, can influence a result. Basically, Essien slipping in min 91 vs Chelsea is one of the most important single moment in that CL campaign for Barcelona. Madrid this year and in 2016 had like 5-6 of those moments where random factors helped them immensely (less so in 2017).
 
Last edited:

te amo barca

Blaugrana al vent
Why do they need Odriozola though? Carvajal is one of the best RB when in form and Hakimi is alright. Nacho can play RB too. My guess is that they are willing to loan Hakimi out?
 

serghei

Senior Member
On verge of signing Odriozola.

So they'll have two RBs that are better than our Starting RB :lol:

Very much doubt that. Based on how shit Carvajal was this season, I'd say neither of Madrid's RBs are that much better than ours atm, if at all. The leftback is where the difference is clear, it's day and night between Marcelo and Alba in terms of offensive play. RB? Not so much this season.
 

El Flaco

Active member
Why do they need Odriozola though? Carvajal is one of the best RB when in form and Hakimi is alright. Nacho can play RB too. My guess is that they are willing to loan Hakimi out?

Because Odriozola is a quality player who can provide great competition at the RB spot. Carvajal has been pretty underwhelming (apart from few occasions) this season. Hakimi is not good enough for playing at the club and Nacho doesn't offer much going forward.
 

DonAK

President of FC Barcelona
Very much doubt that. Based on how shit Carvajal was this season, I'd say neither of Madrid's RBs are that much better than ours atm, if at all. The leftback is where the difference is clear, it's day and night between Marcelo and Alba in terms of offensive play. RB? Not so much this season.

I respect your optimism, which is strange given how you outlined the problems this squad have just a few weeks back, but Carvajal is leagues above Roberto as a RB.
 

Home of Barca Fans

Top