We should have won that Champions League,but seems that the stars wanted otherwise.After that 2010-2011 seaqson and with the transfer of Fabregas,i thought no one can stop us,but he indeed interrupted the flow of the team,i remember being very frustrated with him,he seem so out of place in that Barca team.Regarding the comparison between Barca of last year Pep and Barca MSN after the CL.i think people forget how good was Pep's Barca.Even if we didn't won the CL in every season,and lost the title in 2012 to an incredible Real Madrid,we were still the best team in every year in that period.MSN was spectaular,but they don't hold a candle to the best team in history imo.
The tragedy of the 2011/12 season
- Thread starter bismp
- Start date
Fati_Future_BallonDor
Well-known member
11/12 was different tier of barcelona but mostly because of Messi. I mean he scored 73 goals that season, these are numbers which are not normal. I would say 11/12 we were stronger overall but in attack MSN is still uncomparable.
Marshall D Teach
Well-known member
Di Matteo's black magic > Zidane's
Mistyoptic
New member
Really good post. I remember that season like it was yesterday, and it did very much feel like a modern tragedy. Two quotes from The Barcelona Legacy, by Jonathon Wilson (amazing book by the way, highly recommend) basically sum it up for me:
'There was a weariness about Barcelona towards the end of that season, but there was something more. Guardiola believes in the need for perpetual revolution. He is always fiddling, always adapting, always aware of the dangers of staleness or complacency. He converted Lionel Messi into a false nine. He signed Zlatan Ibrahimovic to provide a different option in attack. And yet, in his final season at Barcelona, he seemed to become like some figure from Greek tragedy, not merely unable to avert a destiny of which he was very aware, but finding that the measures he took to avert it were precisely those that ensured it came to pass.'
'By then, you wonder also whether Guardiola, clearly contemplating the end, was in the grip of a fatalistic idealism. Guardiola could not prevent the dissolution of the ego, but he could at least take back control of the circumstances of its dissolution and thereby invest it with meaning. His principles might be leading him to destruction, but rather than easing back he pressed on. He might fail, he would fail, but he would be failing in the most Barca-ish of ways.'
I think that season is very complicated for a lot of Barca fans (or it is for me anyway) because I don't want to give Mourinho and Real that much credit and say 'they ended Barca' like Mourinho was hired to do, but at the same time it's important to acknowledge just how good they were that year. I do think that a lot of that was just the incredibly talented Real squad got tired of getting whooped and said 'No Mas', but also Mourinho's counter attack has probably never been as dangerous as it was in that year, with Ronaldo etc. That being said, there were an enormous range of factors at Barca that contributed to it all. The recurrence of Abidal's cancer, injuries to Villa (I disagree about 10/11, I think he was world class in that season), and tactical issues like Cesc (who was awful for us, regardless of how many stat-padding goals he scored against bottom feeder sides) all played a big role. So, a lot of our problems were self-inflicted, but we'd had such a small squad for such a long time that it was almost inevitable that we'd run out of luck sooner or later. Also, the kit was awful. I still have my Busquets jersey from that year but I never wear it - the memories are painful and the stripes are so ugly!
That particular week, where it all came crashing down, was some Infinity War style material. Knocked out the Champions League by that Chelsea team (they still had all the old guard, which is what made it so painful) and then capping it off by losing the league to Ronaldo and Mourinho...it couldn't be worse really. We got done by all of our worst enemies.
This video still makes me cry, especially at the end. I don't look back on that season as a failure, we went out in such a cinematic way, it was almost fitting. And for four years, we were so blessed. You just have to be grateful for what we had, and appreciate the fairy-tale nature of it all.
'There was a weariness about Barcelona towards the end of that season, but there was something more. Guardiola believes in the need for perpetual revolution. He is always fiddling, always adapting, always aware of the dangers of staleness or complacency. He converted Lionel Messi into a false nine. He signed Zlatan Ibrahimovic to provide a different option in attack. And yet, in his final season at Barcelona, he seemed to become like some figure from Greek tragedy, not merely unable to avert a destiny of which he was very aware, but finding that the measures he took to avert it were precisely those that ensured it came to pass.'
'By then, you wonder also whether Guardiola, clearly contemplating the end, was in the grip of a fatalistic idealism. Guardiola could not prevent the dissolution of the ego, but he could at least take back control of the circumstances of its dissolution and thereby invest it with meaning. His principles might be leading him to destruction, but rather than easing back he pressed on. He might fail, he would fail, but he would be failing in the most Barca-ish of ways.'
I think that season is very complicated for a lot of Barca fans (or it is for me anyway) because I don't want to give Mourinho and Real that much credit and say 'they ended Barca' like Mourinho was hired to do, but at the same time it's important to acknowledge just how good they were that year. I do think that a lot of that was just the incredibly talented Real squad got tired of getting whooped and said 'No Mas', but also Mourinho's counter attack has probably never been as dangerous as it was in that year, with Ronaldo etc. That being said, there were an enormous range of factors at Barca that contributed to it all. The recurrence of Abidal's cancer, injuries to Villa (I disagree about 10/11, I think he was world class in that season), and tactical issues like Cesc (who was awful for us, regardless of how many stat-padding goals he scored against bottom feeder sides) all played a big role. So, a lot of our problems were self-inflicted, but we'd had such a small squad for such a long time that it was almost inevitable that we'd run out of luck sooner or later. Also, the kit was awful. I still have my Busquets jersey from that year but I never wear it - the memories are painful and the stripes are so ugly!
That particular week, where it all came crashing down, was some Infinity War style material. Knocked out the Champions League by that Chelsea team (they still had all the old guard, which is what made it so painful) and then capping it off by losing the league to Ronaldo and Mourinho...it couldn't be worse really. We got done by all of our worst enemies.
This video still makes me cry, especially at the end. I don't look back on that season as a failure, we went out in such a cinematic way, it was almost fitting. And for four years, we were so blessed. You just have to be grateful for what we had, and appreciate the fairy-tale nature of it all.
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bismp
Well-known member
Great reply, I agree with you, we went out, but we went out poetically,with a BANG.
Like some of you guys said, this season is instilled in my memory,maybe even more than other far more successful seasons.
Everything was against us, but we still stayed true to our football philosophy and produced some of the most magical moments of the Pep era.
And yes,it was extremely tragic to get eliminated from the two main tournaments in such a way in a span of a few days,but looking back it was indeed reminiscent of a greek tragedy.
Like some of you guys said, this season is instilled in my memory,maybe even more than other far more successful seasons.
Everything was against us, but we still stayed true to our football philosophy and produced some of the most magical moments of the Pep era.
And yes,it was extremely tragic to get eliminated from the two main tournaments in such a way in a span of a few days,but looking back it was indeed reminiscent of a greek tragedy.
bismp
Well-known member
And maybe 2015 Messi was more complete or 2019 Messi was more mature or 2011 Messi was more clutch etc,but 2012 Messi was such a beast...
His stats may have been inflated by the severe lack of other attacking options(for example in 2014/15 he scored more than 55 goals despite playing with Suarez and Neymar),but he was in god mode all season long.
His stats may have been inflated by the severe lack of other attacking options(for example in 2014/15 he scored more than 55 goals despite playing with Suarez and Neymar),but he was in god mode all season long.
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