₦airaland Forum

The match started a bit poorly, with the defence struggling.but our excellent midfield/attack won the match again.

I feel a bit bad for Rayo but such is life. They actually did very well in the 1st half.

I like Tito's subs. I think Tito can be just as successful as Pep. At least he seems not as emotional as Pep which is a good thing.pep'semotions kept us from getting the best from players like Ibra. Tito is squeezing out the best from this team right now!

I got the line-up wrong: Adriano and Song start at CB, Montoya starts and Iniesta is rested, not Xavi - guess that's to have some possession and control.

I only got the attack right.

AjanleKoko: Menotti echoes my sentiments about the current side. The defensive rut is affecting overall play more than one would think.
Add to that the damning statistic that Barcelona have been behind in seven games so far this season. Going a goal or two down will always change the momentum for both sides, and will affect the progression of play. I still sa,y fix the defence and we might win everything. Don't fix the defence and we might win nothing.

If the defence can hold for the moment, I think the team will be successful this season. Unfortunately, it's highly unlikely that the club will buy a defender in the winter break, so I'm just praying the defenders recover and suffe minimal injuries for the rest of the season. If all goes well, we will have Puyol, pique, Masche and Bartra as CBs, with Abidal possibly making a return before the season ends. RB and LB are pretty much ok. The rest of the team is sorted.

Very few teams can cope with the kind of absentees we have (although I admit our squad is too thin at the back). Our entire 1st back 4 has been missing for several weeks now. Madrid lost to Dortmund because they have 3 defenders missing. See as ManU de struggle too.

I know we have issues, but I give it to Tito for doing a good job so far.

My line up for tonight:

Valdez

Adriano-Bartra-Song-Alba

Cesc-Busquests-Iniesta

MVP (Messi in the middle)

Rayo 1 - 3 Barca

Johnpaul88: Malaga keeps impressing in the most facinating way possible. They could even afford the luxury of miss a penalty against Milan yet they won so convincingly without conceding. Their impressive stat now reads P3,W3,L0,F7,A0.
I can't bet
against them reaching the quater finals. Pellegrini can pull it off again as with Villareal. I'm happy for them.

Yeah, I'm also impressed with Malaga. They are currently the best club in Europe right now - no goals conceded in UCL. But they need to keep their feet on the ground and realize that they are in a relatively easy group, with Milan at the weakest I've ever known.

I'm also impressed that they're in a good position in La Liga, considering their disastrous summer.

Talking UCL:

I'm impressed that Schalke managed to break Arsenal's unbeaten run at home, a feat that even Barcelona couldn't do in 2 attempts. And like JP mentioned, Afellay has been very good with Schalke since he joined. I hope he can come back next season or worst case we sell him for a good price.

More UCL:
Is Dynamo Kiev the club with most Nigerians? Ideye Brown, Taiye Taiwo, Yusuf Ayila, Haruna Lukman...

AJ
I see your point in that the defence affects the general play. But today, we defended quite well and the defence only had to deal with the counter-attacks, which they did well enough. But when attacking, we did just what we did against Chelsea: lots of possession with little penetration, passes to the left and right, around the box.

On counter-attacks, we have always suffered against counters. Remember when Rijkaard's team faced Chelsea in UCL the first time? The hit us with 3 goals in like 20 mins from counters.Chelsea, again, last season, hit us with counters to knock us out of the UCL. Rubin Kazan hit us with counters to beat us in the Camp Nou a couple of seasons ago.

I actually don't mind if we don't press too much against park the bus teams - let them have the ball a bit, come at us and then we hit then quickly once we retrieve the ball back.

Overall, I think Tito's team will be just as good as Pep's (or even better), once most of the absentees return.

Soldado got a hattrick against Bate Boriso (away match) to take his team to the top of the group. Wish them the best.

Relief that we won eventually. pep's team would have drawn this one, so I still respect Tito's team.

BUT...we aer still struggling against these defensive teams.

Whenever we attacked, there was hardly anyone in the opposition box – sometimes I wish we had one not-as-mobile attacker who would be happy to stay in the box (a la Lewandowski, Llorente) who would just sit up there and receive the passes from our excellent midfielders.

Bartra had a very good game and I’m sure Tito will play him more often. He actually plays like Pique sometimes and I’ll like to see him alongside Pique/Puyol soon.

Classic Barca goal by Iniesta. Excellent combo by the 3 'short men' Messi, Xavi, Iniesta.

Our guys need to shoot jare! Adriano is the only player attempting shots. Iniesta, Xavi, Pedro, etc are all looking for the perfect through ball. We need Villa or Cesc.

Now that Celtic has taken the lead, Alexis' miss becomes more important.

We're struggling to break their defence and the goal was from a classic counterr-attack + classic set piece, 2 things we continue to struggle against.

Tito is forced to start Bartra. I hope he proves all of us right.

We have no more defensive cover - we cannot afford any injury @ the back.

Alexis is silly for missing that very early chance!

AjanleKoko: Just that he isn't a center-back, and shouldn't be playing that position for Barca. Shikena.

Let them play Bartra. Montoya has been pretty decent so far. In fact, he hasn't done worse than Alves defensively. Maybe not so confident in attack, but certainly not so bad in defence.

I agree with you.

And I feel that we'll soon see Bartra. I guess Tito was waiting for CDR to start and use him there to gain the experience, but Puyol & Pique got injured and he feels it's better to stick in Song than Bartra, not to wreck the young man's confidence, int he event he makes a defensive blunder that leads to a goal.

Johnpaul88: Falcao scored a stoppage time winner at Real Sociedad through a wonderful free kick to ensure they remain at par with the table topper, Barca and eight points ahead of their big City rival, Real Madrid.
I really wish they can sustain this for much longer and perhaps give us a genuine rivaly at the top outside of Madrid.

Most La Liga fans will like to see a change in La Liga, but I'm sure Atleti will suffer once they need to play consecutive mid-week matches in UEL and CDR. Simeone is doing a good job, but Atleti is as broke as anything - they cannot build on their successes and will sell Falcao in the summer.

But it's a good start and let's hope some balance can shift in la Liga, not necessarily this season but in the next few years.

eyoniggar: Would any1 agree with me, Tito rotates players more than Guadio did?

Yes he does and I like the fact that Tito's team is less predictable than Pep's.

medjai: You definitely didn't see Ruud Hesp or Rustu in between the sticks for us.

Lol, Hesp was an absolute disaster, but Rustu's situation was more complex, since he didn't really settle down in the team

Mcleo007: tHE Barca philosophy does not favour the goalkeeper.

I bet u, even the likes of Joe Hart, Hugo Lloris and Iker Casillas will be sub-par when placed in the Barca system.

.

Sorry I have to disagree with you. We over-state the "Barca system" sometimes. Any decent keeper will do well where they go - it's not like Barca goalkeepers are required to have their hands tied behind their backs.

The same thought process you have above is when people say "it's difficult to find a CB who fits in the Barca system". But notice how many players who didn't grow up in the Barca system, yet managed to succeed in Barca: Ronaldinho, Deco, Etoo, Yaya Toure, Abidal, Alves, Mascherano, Villa, Zambrotta, Marquez, Giuly, Henrik Larsson, etc.

I think the "they cannot succeed in the Barca system" statement is just an excuse for the club not to buy players most times.

What a crazy game! It must have been fun for neutrals but for a Barca fan, it was frustrating to watch the team sqander a healthy lead and only just manage to win.

Alba's moment of madness produced a goal many strikers would dream of, while the ref added to the madness with his many yellow cards in the 2nd half.

Ok, we eventually won, but all the issues with the defence are plain to see. Investing in a DMF when CB was needed, not buying back Botia, not giving Bartra the chance to grow into the team...all these decisions may come back to hurt the team.

In attack, its clear to see why Tello gets the start - he's more direct than the others.

Villa isn't quite ready to start many matches yet.

Fab was excellent.

Next up Celtic.

medjai: Fontas to go on loan to Mallorca till the end of the season

Yeah, it's necessary for him to go on loan to a club where he won't be under as much pressure to impress. Let's see how he turns out.

The bad news for him is that Barca rarely welcomes back players that go on loan/buy back deals: Saviola, Hleb, Merti Riverola, Botia, etc.

AjanleKoko: If we can turn up the gas like we did in the second half against all teams in la Liga, I think we can win the league.

Tito's team Barcelona is becoming the king of comebacks. The team is shaping up well, apart from defence.

AjanleKoko: I was actually happy to see Montoya get a chance. Though he was a bit slow in reaction, leading to Ronaldo's second goal. But I have no complaints. The kids need to start playing. Shoot me, but he played better than most people would have expected. Even saw a shot bounce off the crossbar.

Both Ronaldo's goals may have been easily prevented but poor positioning from the makeshift defenders.

Yeah true. For me, I have no issues with using a makeshift defender, but he should be paired with a regular CB. 2 makeshift defenders is a no-no. I hope Bartra starts to get some minutes now, because the club claims they didn't buy a CB because we have Bartra and Fontas already in the squad.

Excellent match.

Strange to see Adriano playing as CB (I don't recall him ever playing in this role). The lack of CBs is already costing us and the season is only a few weeks old - let's hope things improve, especially if Abidal is able to make a return to football.

We are still 8 points ahead of Madrid and the team is looking good. We just need a few guys to return from injury.

I like the fact that the players still seem hungry, which is very important.

@yourangel

Welcome to the forum. Just like it takes a discerning driver to love a Saab (so they say), it takes a discerning football fan to support Barca (especially if you're old enough to have been a fan btwn 1998 and 2005, when we won little).

ddippset: last season barca won the super cups, the club world cup and the spanish fa cup(copa del rey). i do not agree that it was a 'worst' season or it was even a bad season. i think it was a good season. if barca loses the title to a the richest club in world football with great superstars like casilas, ronaldo, marcelo, pepe, ramos, higuain, benzema, de maria, ozil, kaka, alonso, khedira, and co, after dominating for 3 seasons, i dont think it was a failure. also if barca failed to retain the uefa champions league after making the semis for 5 straight seasons, it's not a bad season at all. it's either the bar had been raised to high or the detractors are being mischievous. so i think barca had a good season and messi had the greatest individual season in world football. i also hink that something needs to be done very fast about the defence. i have a gut feeling that soon that makeshift defence is going to boomerang. i hope abidal, pique and puyol come back 100% soon.

Come on guys...we all know that winning super cups cannot be compared wo winning actual cups. let's be honest, we were all disappointed that the team did not win the real targets: UCL and league. I agree that in absolute terms, last season was successful, but relative to the 3 previous seasons under Pep, it was not successful - ok, let me rephrase: last season was the least successful season under Pep.

Back to Messi, I agree that he's the best footballer and will soon be the greatest ever. But the fact remains that we do better when others share the scoring duties than when Messi tries to do it all by himself. That's the beauty of football - no matte how good you are, you still need a good team to excel.

Hmmm...thread has been very active the last couple of days. You all just got talkative!

For the Classico, I think anyone expecting to see Bartra ay is being very optimistic. Tito hasn't used Bartra inless important matches, why would he suddenly use him now?

In defence, I'm sure it will be Song and Masche againg, with Busquests in DMF. In midfield, I expect the Xavi Inista combo to return and in attack, I expect to see Messi, Pedro, Tello since the boss likes Tello so much.

In any case, our objective should be to avoid a 2nd consecutive classico loss. A draw is a good result and a win is a bonus. Madrid is the team under pressure not us. Ronaldo is the unhappy star, not Messi!

The boys should just go out there, enjoy themselves and pass Madrid to death. And avoid being knocked unconcious by Pepe.

I didn't manage to contribute to the debate about whether a selfish Messi is good for the team or not.

For ma, I prefer the Messi of this season - he's playing deeper and is less selfish than last season. Pedro and Alexis now seem to have realized that they are also there to provide goals, not just pass to Messi. If they look around themselves and can't see Messi, they don't have a choice but to shoot.

Last season, a "selfish" broke all scoring records, but the team ended up having the worst season in the Pep era. Ok, I know Messi also had loads of assists, so it's difficult to say he's selfish. This season, Messi has scored slightly fewer goals, but the team has a 100% record in La Liga and UCL.

So, let's have a less selfish Messi and let the other players pick up some of the scoring responsibility. It makes the team less predictable and increases our chances of winning against teams like Chelsea.

Sad to see Puyol injured AGAIN! We knew Puyol would only play like half the games this season, but he;s getting some really bad luck with injuries. I hope our makeshift defence can avoid leaking goals against Madrid.

On to the match itself...Benfica is the perfect kind of opponent for Barca, they cannot defend to save their lives and they tend to play an open, attacking game. We won that match comfortably and the people asking for entertaining soccer finally got their wish.

AJ, you now see why I said I like this group? No walkovers to make us complacent, but every team in the group is beatable unless we lose concentration.

Sad to see Thiago injured. And just as CDR is about to start - such a shame because I'm sure Tito will use our first team subs with team B players for the early stages of the CDR.

Good to know some of the injured players will be returning soon. At least the team managed to win every match even with the absentees. Good!

usbcable: never gonna happen.
ask ruddie he def say same.

Why not? Sevilla has just lost their first match of the season. I They've strengthened their defence and while the competition for Europa places will be tough, I expect Sevilla to be there in the mix.

AjanleKoko: I am almost hoping for an injury or suspension to Song, Mascherano, or Sergio (he's almost there), and then Bartra will have to play.

Sometimes I think like that too. We have 3 excellent DMs, but these guys are not CBs - I want to see Bartra too!

AjanleKoko: I slightly differ here. Cesc's first goal was quite well-taken and was a snap shot off the bounce. Messi or somebody had just stumbled off the ball. Shows what Cesc can bring to the team.
Messi has also improved on the set pieces. Palop had to pull off a stunning save to deny his dipping effort. Almost a sure goal. he's already scored two free kicks this season.

Tito seems to be a bigger fanatic of all-out attacking than Pep. Pulling out two full-backs for two strikers?

Looks like you misunderstood me slightly. Earlier in the match, Cesc had a chance to go one-on-one with the keeper, but back-heeled to Messi who was in a worse position to score. There were times when Sanchez & Villa did the same. Against the classic park-the-bus teams, we won't get so many chances.

I actually liked Cesc's 2 goals - we don't shoot from outside the box often enough and that's what he did for the 1st goal.

I like Tito's team so far, I like his tactical flexibility - Pep was too philosophical sometimes. Eg, Pep will face Chelsea the same way he faces Getafe to remain "true to the cause". I can already see Tito changing things based on opponent's strengths and weaknesses.

This was a roller coaster match! Sevilla did it to Real and almost beat us too. We were quite lucky that the ref had a few dodgy decisions that gave Barca advantages at critical periods (the Thiago handball, the Busquests yellow instead of red. The red card to Medel was justified due to the headbutt on Cesc).

I like Sevilla and I hope they are consistent this season and manage to get to the European places. If teams like Valencia, Sevilla, Athletic Bilbao, Atletico Madrid and Malaga are consistent in the league, there’s no reason why La Liga should be such a terrible two horse race. Even if they lose or draw against Barca and Real, they can still pick up points from the smaller teams and make the league more interesting.

My key highlights:

Cesc: Good to see him saving the team. For a guy many fans have derided recently, he came up with the goods today and justified his selection.

Defence: We’ve all said it: We cannot continue to use 2 midfielders in CB. Just doesn't make sense. Again I say it: we should have paid the 3m required to buy back Botia this summer. Anyway, the hope now is for pique & Puyol to recover and if possible, Abidal also. I’ll like to see Bartra in Kings Cup matches. If all goes well, we should have a good defence when needed. For now, we survive with what we have.

Attack: I still don’t understand why our attackers try to pass the ball when they’re in good positions to shoot in the box. Cesc, Villa and Alexis were all guilty. Fortunately, it didn't hurt the team today, but it’s something that will certainly matter against park the bus teams, especially the big ones like Cheski.

Tito: If nothing else, Tito is a genius when he comes to subs. His subs have been on point every match so far. Oh and we have 6 wins out of 6.

Good analyses guys. I agree with JP on winning these tough encounters and not necessarily dishing out manitas every weekend. If we are consistent, especially away from Camp Nou, this season, the league is ours.

Like everyone else I worry abouit the defence. I don't understand why the club promotes youth defenders and the coaches keep using midfielders when the main CBs are out. I hope we see Bartra playing soon, even if we need to use a double pivot to protect the defence.

As for Xavi, that was a wonder strike. Hope to see more of that.

Cesc seems to be going thro some crisis. He hasn't scored at all in 2012 and I think he's quite confused as he has been asked to play too many positions since he got here: central MF, attacking MF, false 9, false 10.

I don't care who gets injured, so long as Messi stays fit. If we lose Messi for anything more than 2 games, this team will surely falter. So make we all de pray for good health for Messi, no flu, no knee issues, no ankle injury, no woman problem.

Messi has done it again! Normal service resumed

I certainly prefer Tito's subs to Pep - he has no qualms playing with 4 attackers. By now Pep woulda brought in Keita

What? I thought we would have learnt from Chelsea, Inter, etc

We still struggle with parked buses. I hope people now see why people like me want a tall option B striker.

What a stupid OG by Alves. Good job by Emenike, sloppy job by our defenders.

Tello just told me to shut up!