Barcilliant
Senior Member
How much money I'd Dickverde paying his supporters to come and troll on the forums?
Quique Setien
- Thread starter FC433
- Start date
Barcilliant
Senior Member
The way Tackle and BBQ support him you would have thought Dickverde won back to back trebles.
MTL_Barca
Well-known member
Can we please just ban Valverde from this thread 
I thought the game was alright. In the end it was an important win away and hopefully gives the team some confidence.
Once again showed the problems of the squad as well though, if people complain about 17 year old Fati not starting every game you know it's bad.
I thought the game was alright. In the end it was an important win away and hopefully gives the team some confidence.
Once again showed the problems of the squad as well though, if people complain about 17 year old Fati not starting every game you know it's bad.
JohnN
Senior Member
Betis played their hearts out, like playing cl final style intensity, especially in the first half. But the amazing thing is we had more stamina in the end.
Another great fact is the refering, once again, let's teams play way too hard away from home. Also letting Messi get beat up without awarding a yellow card and not giving a clear as day penalty. Not even going to var, which is of course illegal.
All these things should point out we will lose the League.
Our play is improving, which is good..
Another great fact is the refering, once again, let's teams play way too hard away from home. Also letting Messi get beat up without awarding a yellow card and not giving a clear as day penalty. Not even going to var, which is of course illegal.
All these things should point out we will lose the League.
Our play is improving, which is good..
FinBarcelonafan
Well-known member
We ran way less than Betis. At least around 80 min we had 5-6 km less. So makes sense.
JohnN
Senior Member
Good teams try to press us out of the pitch for the first half, which makes them really vulnerable in the second. We need to take advantage of that. Perhaps not trying to build from the back when they have pushed all of their team in our half, but dropping a long ball behind their defence now and then to keep them honest.
Thought it was a He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named style win tbh. The early penalty shouldn't have happened with the ref missing the blatant freekick further up the pitch, even if it's 2 mins later, they gained the ball from a foul and then were awarded a penalty. The biggest difference I'm noticing with Setien is that we seem to have the midfield under control for longer periods of time than we did with HWMNBN, so that to me is an improvement. Still some way to go with it though.
Firpo needs to be sold back to Betis for a cut price, let's just move on and accept it, doesn't look comfortable on the ball ever.
Vidal needs more discipline, runs around the pitch like a maniac at times, but he's the only one willing to play risky passes and be direct with attacking. Unfortunately it's not been his forte all his career so he kinda seems like he's acting on instinct as opposed to knowing what he's doing, sometimes it comes off, other times not so much. 100% need to keep him though, he's recognised a role that needs filling in the team and he's grabbed it by both hands.
Griezmann on the other hand...looks lost and like he doesn't know his place in the team. Could be forgiven if when given the chances he scored but he doesn't. Another €120m down the drain? Maybe not down the drain but his performances so far warrant probably a €50m price tag, not what we paid. Still plenty of the season to go.
Defence is a joke, Umtiti looks scared on the ball, Lenglet weak body and weak mind, yep he got a goal but that's hardly going to be a regular thing.
Upamecano needs to be a priority this transfer window. Contract expires 2021. He's physical, bossed Lewandowski yesterday physically.
Firpo needs to be sold back to Betis for a cut price, let's just move on and accept it, doesn't look comfortable on the ball ever.
Vidal needs more discipline, runs around the pitch like a maniac at times, but he's the only one willing to play risky passes and be direct with attacking. Unfortunately it's not been his forte all his career so he kinda seems like he's acting on instinct as opposed to knowing what he's doing, sometimes it comes off, other times not so much. 100% need to keep him though, he's recognised a role that needs filling in the team and he's grabbed it by both hands.
Griezmann on the other hand...looks lost and like he doesn't know his place in the team. Could be forgiven if when given the chances he scored but he doesn't. Another €120m down the drain? Maybe not down the drain but his performances so far warrant probably a €50m price tag, not what we paid. Still plenty of the season to go.
Defence is a joke, Umtiti looks scared on the ball, Lenglet weak body and weak mind, yep he got a goal but that's hardly going to be a regular thing.
Upamecano needs to be a priority this transfer window. Contract expires 2021. He's physical, bossed Lewandowski yesterday physically.
malvolio
Senior Member
shh...we don't do that in here
don't know about our midfield controlling the game. sure, it seems that we have longer possession periods and we move the ball around for longer. problem is that once we lose possession we are shitting ourselves. midfield commits an error and our defense is caught on the back foot, conceding lots of dangerous attacks.
since setien took over we didn't have one single match in which we were totally in control of the game or the result. always shaky, always conceding lots of chances, always creating chances that we fail to convert in to goals.
shh...we don't do that in here
don't know about our midfield controlling the game. sure, it seems that we have longer possession periods and we move the ball around for longer. problem is that once we lose possession we are shitting ourselves. midfield commits an error and our defense is caught on the back foot, conceding lots of dangerous attacks.
since setien took over we didn't have one single match in which we were totally in control of the game or the result. always shaky, always conceding lots of chances, always creating chances that we fail to convert in to goals.
Haha won't do that again. I think I just see us moving the ball quicker and holding on to it longer than we did. And take better care of it with genuine options being in place. A lot of what we saw start of the season seemed to be relying on individual players getting the ball to the next guy as opposed to a system being in place to keep the ball. Maybe I'm just seeing it through rose tinted glasses lol who knows.
Our defence is far too weak. If we had a capable centre half pairing losing the ball would be less of an issue.
malvolio
Senior Member
right now we still don't know who are our starting midfielders and what is their best position(don't think setien knows that either, for now). i don't know if the midfield mistakes which put pressure on the defense are a system problem or only individual(aka playing the wrong players). sure, could be compensated with smarter/faster defenders, but either way it's just asking for trouble playing like that.
JohnN
Senior Member
I am not sure if we have just had a bad run of luck with all these injuries or our pre-season preparation was bullocks, but moving on, this is my take until now:
On an individual level:
Some players seem to be doing better like Busquets, Semedo, Fati.
Messi is Messi with some tough luck scoring lately but with more involvement and chasing balls. FDJ was crap until last game where he was great. Arthur was crap until the previous game but seems to be on top form now.
- Sergi Roberto, Griezmann, Rakitic, Umtiti, Firpo and Vidal don't look like they belong in this team. With the exception of Vidal who has some use cases, I think the rest should leave in the summer.
- Firpo seems limited.
- Rakitic is done at the top level.
- Roberto was never a Barca level player.
- Griezmann is a really bad fit, and in my opinion overrated.
- Umtiti is so unstable that Pique looks like a defensive god compared to him.
On a team level:
- The team looks more motivated. I guess, mostly due to the "new manager effect".
- Our attacking patterns are improved and we create plenty of chances, which we mostly fail to finish due to bad luck (for example Messi, Griezmann in the last two matches).
- Our "always play out of the back" tactics need to have some variation when the other team presses too hard or we' re gonna pay for that. Also, without Busi - Arthur - FDJ midfield, we cannot implement the "always play out of the back" tactics.
- Our defense's main problem is personel. It's not tactical. For example in the last game, the second goal starts with Vidal making an unforced error, due to his bad technique and ends with Umtiti backing off for several seconds, instead of blocking the attacker.
- We have established more control over games but are still really vulnerable against counter attacks, starting from mistakes made from pressure. We deal pretty well with constructed attacks in my opinion, but these are rare against us.
The obvious problem with our team right now is that our flaws are easily analysed and can be exploited by any physically strong team.
We are susceptible to errors when under extreme pressure and counter attacks, so any good team will try to do that from the first minute.
As long as refs don't whistle on hard fouls, the opponents will just go harder and harder making it impossible to play a technical game with our current players.
We used to be able to break this initial press by having technical beasts like Xavi, Iniesta, Busi, Messi, Dani. But now we will just not be able to do that, so another tactic is required. I hope Setien realises this and finds a solution.
On an individual level:
Some players seem to be doing better like Busquets, Semedo, Fati.
Messi is Messi with some tough luck scoring lately but with more involvement and chasing balls. FDJ was crap until last game where he was great. Arthur was crap until the previous game but seems to be on top form now.
- Sergi Roberto, Griezmann, Rakitic, Umtiti, Firpo and Vidal don't look like they belong in this team. With the exception of Vidal who has some use cases, I think the rest should leave in the summer.
- Firpo seems limited.
- Rakitic is done at the top level.
- Roberto was never a Barca level player.
- Griezmann is a really bad fit, and in my opinion overrated.
- Umtiti is so unstable that Pique looks like a defensive god compared to him.
On a team level:
- The team looks more motivated. I guess, mostly due to the "new manager effect".
- Our attacking patterns are improved and we create plenty of chances, which we mostly fail to finish due to bad luck (for example Messi, Griezmann in the last two matches).
- Our "always play out of the back" tactics need to have some variation when the other team presses too hard or we' re gonna pay for that. Also, without Busi - Arthur - FDJ midfield, we cannot implement the "always play out of the back" tactics.
- Our defense's main problem is personel. It's not tactical. For example in the last game, the second goal starts with Vidal making an unforced error, due to his bad technique and ends with Umtiti backing off for several seconds, instead of blocking the attacker.
- We have established more control over games but are still really vulnerable against counter attacks, starting from mistakes made from pressure. We deal pretty well with constructed attacks in my opinion, but these are rare against us.
The obvious problem with our team right now is that our flaws are easily analysed and can be exploited by any physically strong team.
We are susceptible to errors when under extreme pressure and counter attacks, so any good team will try to do that from the first minute.
As long as refs don't whistle on hard fouls, the opponents will just go harder and harder making it impossible to play a technical game with our current players.
We used to be able to break this initial press by having technical beasts like Xavi, Iniesta, Busi, Messi, Dani. But now we will just not be able to do that, so another tactic is required. I hope Setien realises this and finds a solution.
malvolio
Senior Member
my take is that only busquets has really shown some improvement, but with his current physical condition he is prone to mistakes when teams target him. semedo has always been a so and so player for us. he should be sold since he already is 26 and hasn't shown signs of being an undisputed starter for us.
fati is still very young, and it's not like he didn't have some good games before setien coming in.
you could argue that messi has regressed, since he isn't scoring as much. but that would be a major overstatement so it is what it is.
fdj and arthur had good and bad games. maybe setien finally discovered how to utilize fdj, considering his last game.
there were like 3 standout individual performances, each of them in a different game: busquets, fdj and semedo.
i agree with Roberto, Griezmann, Rakitic, Umtiti, Firpo and Vidal all being sold. too old or too shite for us.
JohnN
Senior Member
Messi usually has a drop of scoring form in January-february. But he really hasn't regressed. He has more involvement in moves and tracks back way more. He has outrageous assist stats lately. Some let offs with his dribbles but also some amazing dribbles per game. Gets fouled a lot without a foul given too. I would say he is himself, but age creeps in slowly..
Home of Barca Fans
