I did it once, and will do it again!

Date: Wednesday, March 17, 2010-03-16

Location: Camp Nou

Time: 22:30, moments after the final whistle of the game between Barcelona and Stuttgart.

“If I just tracked back a bit faster…” thinks Alves…

“If I was more focused while heading that ball” murmurs Ibra…

“I should have yelled at Pique to pay attention…I had my doubts he wasn’t alert when…” and the caveman Puyol shake his head with disbelief!

Lot of “If” roaring wild beasts attack the chests of the players torturing their senses and their pride, but it’s all too late.  Barcelona will defend their title no more. It was all because of those little things that decided the destiny of the team in the competition. Avoidable yet irreversible little things. One step forward here, more timed tackle there, a bit of aggression here, a moment that lacked enough determination there, same old story… Then crying on spoiled milk! Then desperate wishes to fix what’s permanently decided. Time never bounce back right?

BUT HAVE NO FEARS FELLAS! It happened! Ha? Yeap. The magic spell that I can use only once. The one I’ve been saving till that truck hits me in the middle of the night. I will use it now to turn back the time for couple of hours instead. A chance no one else enjoyed and you will. But first, dive more in the sorrow of the elimination’s moment so it charges you with the fighting spirit you need to make sure that you never reach that scenario ever again. And here we are, back to the game preview, and the players are back to square one. Do NOT save anything for tomorrow. Go for every interception as if your life is on the line. Every run must pump your hearts with aggression, every moment must represent everything you ever dreamed to have, and everything you will ever need. FIGHT! With your hearts, souls, teeth, and nails and ride a winning horse toward the following round of the champions’ league.

Catch me if you can!

Hell that’s the spirit! And that’s what Pep need to inject in the dressing room before the game kickoff. Last Wednesday we’ve witnessed a demonstration of how much heart you need to win this competition. Barcelona is the best football CLUB on the earth. No doubt. If you disagree then you are wrong. This is a club model that any football fan in the world must wish for his favorite club to be remodeled following the Catalan prototype. Yet the best football TEAM in the world is a clumsy idea that I will leave for those who have nothing serious to say. There is no best team in the world. There is a team that fights enough to deserve being labeled so, for being a crowned champion who deserves to be hailed for the achievements. You want to be the best, do your best. Simple equation. And most importantly, stay loyal to the humility that characterize Barcelona players and make the Catalan squad a unique group not only for the qualities but for the personalities as well.

We will play against a team that suffered no defeats on the road this season in the champions’ league. There is nothing much to add about Stuttgart to what I mentioned already in the first leg preview. You can also check Pete Preview for more insight.  This kind of teams creates very tricky challenges.  They are not hyped for their quality so they play under no pressure. Yet, they have all what they need to cause an upset. They proved that in Stuttgart and were just unlucky to get advantage not only from the worst 45 minutes Barcelona played this season but also from an undeniable quality display they performed, earning them a deserved credit and praise. They will try to rewind that in the Camp Nou. Will the lightning strike twice in the same place?

Barcelona:

It will be interesting to see how Pep will approach this game. The most vital issue for me is: Will he fix the defect caused by Abidal and Keita absence?

It has been obvious for a while now, and we are still making the risk of counting on midfield possession and lethal offense (which is not at its best at the moment). Maxwell and Alves are two offense oriented fullbacks. They serve you better when they feel secure enough to race the ball forward on the flanks. Alves is a well known brand already.  We’ve seen some decent performances from Maxell when he had Keita in the midfield to lean on. Since Keita’s injury, I can’t show any satisfaction regarding the way we managed the previous games. We are using Busquets as a holding midfielder with Iniesta/Messi and Xavi in front.  It makes it difficult for the team to release the fullbacks on the flanks to contribute offense wise, as it keeps the two center backs without sufficient depth. Busquets can create a lateral cover for one fullback at a time (and he is doing it decently, for the record), but he can’t cover the two flanks at the same time (No one player can, in case you are having some ideas in mind).  We’ve noticed the two full backs’ hesitation to do their offense responsibilities in many games recently. The worst thing a full back can do is giving it a second though while he is moving forward. It means he will not move forward enough to create damage, and he is not in the right defensive position to create depth. We need to avoid the situation where a player runs forward while looking backward. You can do it by asking your fullbacks to contribute offensively one at a time. But for the type of fullbacks we have, there are plenty of better options.

It’s also interesting to see who will start in the offense line beside Messi and Ibra. Henry showed glances of his old days in the second half against Valencia. But it was through the center. Pedro is the season’s wild card, but recently his star is not shining bright over the hills. Iniesta will also be an expected option if we finally decided to start the right combination in the midfield.

A water carrier, a horse, and a Maestro, that’s my magical troika for Barcelona’s midfield since last season. Not the sexiest ever, so obviously it will get no flirts. But that’s the structure that never disappoint. I would like to see one of these selections, depending on Keita’s readiness for this game, if he is fit enough, then:

Valdes, Alves, Pique, Puyol, Maxwell, Busquets, Keita, Xavi, Iniesta, Ibra, Messi.

Not the popular selection, but the practical one. Henry is the closest player to be included in that lineup. The reasons why I prefer starting Iniesta are:

1)      I am not sure yet how fit Henry is to be considered as a starter. I am not intending the training sessions but after the game against Valencia he enjoyed a moral boost that I prefer not to gamble thru starting him too early. Its better to give him more time to pick up his form gradually rather than leading him back to the dark tunnel thru another passive performance.

2)      If things turned complicated, Henry is a better game changer than Iniesta.

3)      The problem in the first leg was losing the dominance in the midfield. With this selection we can keep things under control. Stuttgart’s defense is not the most reliable department in their team. If we succeeded to dictate the tempo, we will be able to score with time.

If Keita is not available, Iniesta will play in the midfield, with Henry in the offense line. But I wouldn’t mind giving a second try for this one:

Valdes, Alves, Pique, Puyol, Maxwell, Busquets, Yaya, Xavi, Iniesta, Ibra, Messi.

We used this selection in the first leg. The performance in the first half was catastrophic. Yet, by tuning it a bit, it will click perfectly. Yaya need to play closer to the defense –again- to release the fullbacks. The triangle of Puyol, Pique, and Yaya can contain the movements of Cacau and Pogrebnyak which will release Busquets –the alternative holding midfielder- to cover the midfield and check the players slicing through the midfield. When we ride the game, Busquets (or Yaya after switching roles with Busquets) can do the Keita-forward-runs into the box to convoy with Ibra in the area for the fullbacks’ crosses, while Iniesta and Messi are getting advantage of the spaces created.

Valdes, Alves, Pique, Puyol, Maxwell, Busquets, Xavi, Iniesta, Henry, Ibra, Messi.

If we ended up using this selection, then Xavi need to operate from a slightly deeper position than usual. Maxwell has to move forward more efficiently so that Henry cuts inside the box where he is always more effective. More movement into channels from Ibra will be appreciated as it creates more spaces for Henry and Messi to link together thru the center.

But regardless of the selection, the mindset will be the vital factor. If we approached this game calmly without the anxiety to finish the game in the first minute, then we will be fine.

Last season we drew against Lyon 1-1 in France and came back to finish the deal in the Camp Nou. Let’s repeat that, with style.

And remember: The god of football supports Barcelona. Whether you like my previews or not, you will wish that this is not the last preview I publish on this blog. My survival depends solely on Barcelona’s survival in the Champions’ league, which makes me feel more involved in the team, and the competition.

Finally, good luck for Sevilla in their game. After Real Madrid shocking elimination, Sevilla’s qualification for the second round became more crucial to show the true image of the Liga’s football quality. This is a tempting topic to write about, in another ramble.

Do you really want to kick us out of the Champions’ league? Think twice before you try!

I tell you, it’s going to be *exciting*…

When we faced Almería earlier this season and beat them 1-0, they were being led by former Madridista Hugo Sánchez and reached a miserable 17th position on the table before the club decided to replace him with Juanma Lillo, one of the managers our own Pep Guardiola most admires (when he was playing for Roma, under Capello, he said in an interview that he’d love to “listen to the orders of Wegner, Bielsa or Lillo”). Pep’s wish came true in the later years of his career as a footballer, when Lillo was the coach of the Dorados de Culiacán, and when Pep supported Lluís Bassiat for the Barça presidency, in 2003, it was Lillo they wanted to be coach. Not only they are friends, but they also share a similar outlook on football, based on possession, control and all those things we swoon about when Barça is playing pretty.

And it has worked for Lillo and Almería too, albeit in a smaller scale. Since he arrived at the team, Almería has climbed to a more respectable 13th position, losing just one match (against Sevilla, at the dreaded Sánchez Pizjuán, 1-0), with four victories and four draws to their name, and only one match when they’ve failed to score (yes, again Sevilla and that damned Saint Palop). The improvement is undeniable.

And in contrast with Hugo Sánchez’s very unappealing football, as demonstrated earlier this season when he assigned Chico to bodyguard Xavi and drive him to despair (Xavi himself said of that one-on-one marking that it had given him “some of the most uncomfortable moments of the last 10 or 12 years”, which makes me wonder… no, not really, forget it), Lillo not only has promised that there won’t be any one-on-one marking, but also that Almería will try to play their own version of open, daring, pretty football.

“There’s only one ball, and usually Barça has it,” Lillo said when asked how he planned to face the blaugrana. “But we will try to keep playing well and getting good results, especially if the latter is a consequence of the former”. He then went on to speak wonders of Iniesta (“Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo make great moves, but Iniesta makes great football” and “I think that the others are more dependent on him than he is dependent on the others”). He also badmouthed CRon a little, but that’s neither here nor there for this preview; I just mention it because it makes me like Lillo more.

There are no great names in Almería’s team sheet, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t a dangerous team (and let’s not forget we tend to stumble more against ‘small’ teams than against big ones). Uche, Crusat, Goitom, Soriano or Piatti are names that Puyol must be studying very closely, while Xavi won’t be forgetting Chico in a hurry, Messi will have Pellerano and Macedo on his mind, and Ibra surely hasn’t forgotten the occasions he had and that Diego Alves, Almería’s athletic goalkeeper, foiled.

And what about us? Well, Barça has survived the latest bout of ‘FIFA flu’ intact, with only grinning faces and a couple of bruised egos to show after this mini international break (both Henry and Messi have been defended, and hopefully reassured, by their teammates and coach, though). Only Keita and Abidal are still injured, and the latest news is that the Mali midfielder could be back against Valencia; apart from those two, the only absence will be Gerard Piqué’s, who is suspended due to an accumulation of yellow cards. And, after Málaga, we seemed to have recovered the spark that we have been lacking in previous matches, so we should be all good, set, and raring to go and get those three points…

When asked by newspaper Sport who they’d like to see replacing Piqué, people made their opinion very clear…

And for that, my proposed line-up is this:

—————–Valdés—————
Alves—Puyol—Milito—Maxwell
——————-Yaya——————-
————Xavi——-Iniesta————
——–Messi——Ibra——Bojan——

Yes, Milito over Márquez any time of the day (although, to be fair, our Mexican has been getting better), Yaya instead of a Busquets who played the whole 90 minutes against France on Wednesday, and Bojan, because the poor, darling boy deserves to play sometimes and I think those assists he has been giving out lately could really work for Ibra; Pedrito can come in later and score and save the day, like he usually does, should this not work. And Henry? Well, after his lacklustre performance on Wednesday against La Roja, the booing, his subtle complaints, and everything… I think it’s bench-time for him, again, and probably a heart-felt goodbye at the end of the season.

“I want him to rebel and start to help us,” said Pep this morning of the French striker. “We need him and he rebels against that, because he has won everything. But in these situations, we’re here to give him a hand (…) although, in the end, it depends on him”. Pep did deny, vehemently, that he has a poor relationship with Henry, defended him against the criticism that has rained on him after Wednesday’s match, and urged him again to regain his ambition and best form. Whether this will work, or even if Pep means it, it’s a different matter…

But apart from the thorny issue of who exactly is at fault for Henry’s situation, I’m feeling fairly optimistic about this weekend. I think we’ll get to watch some good football and also get a good result (and if Sevilla do their thing and beat RM at home, well, you won’t hear me complaining). I’m betting for a 1-3… and you?

Stuttgart Vs Barcelona 2007 Highlights

December 18, 2009 was the day. Champions’ league draw destined Barcelona to play against VFB Stuttgart in the first knockout round. Barcelona fans were celebrating, Stuttgart fans were (quoting): “praying to God for some Russia-esque type weather for that first leg in Stuttgart”, how is your faith Pete? And ehh…as predicted, Madrid fans were pointing out “The fact” that Barcelona always get an easy draw. As usual, being more focused on Barcelona than their own team made another fact pass unnoticed: Real Madrid were drawn against the same team Barcelona played last season in the same round, Lyon. And based on their league performance, this Lyon is weaker than the 2009’s Version. Anyways…

My initial reaction was the same as I feel now, a mixed of comfort and caution. The comfort that comes from the quality of Barcelona squad, and the concern is the consequence of playing against a team that may not have the hype that increases the Barcelona players’ sense of danger, but a team that have the quality to cause an upset in a good day. Starting from my comment that day in the Champion’s league draw post:

“VfB Stuttgart is no doubt a “less complicated” team (I don’t want to use the word: Easy). Even though they changed their coach recently and the outcome was an unexpected qualification in the CL keeping in mind their position in the group before their last game. It’s an indication that they may get better till we meet them. But will they improve enough to cause troubles? It depends on how we will improve till then. But again, we cant wish a better draw.”

Since then, Stuttgart improved dramatically. Before the Champions league draw they played sixteen games in the Bundesliga. They lost seven, drew Seven, and won only two games against Freiburg and Eintracht. Since December 19, they played seven games in the league, losing one against Hamburg and winning the rest. Now that’s an improvement. No surprise then, their fans’ expectations are higher and the confidence is as good as visiting Barcelona page and posting a comment promising to beat Barcelona 5-0. Dude…I am shaking…

They won their last game 1-5 against Fc Köln. Pep while watching that game, called Vilanova in the 13th minute asking him to check the name of the player who scored Stuttgart’s first goal, and Vilanova told him the commentary called him Cacau or something (Pep listens to cold play CDs while watching the games, so he keeps his TV mute). Eighteen minutes later, Stuttgart scored again, and Pep dialed Puyol number this time, asking him to call Vilanova and check again that player’s name who scored the two goals for Stuttgart and make sure that he organizes with Pique and Milito a plan to mark the guy on Tuesday, even if it requires using half the squad to do so. Eight minutes later Stuttgart scored again and this time Pep called Txiki asking him to find a way to sign that Cacau for Barcelona before the game on Tuesday! Txiki said he can’t, and Barcelona prints will take that as a reason to question the sports director quality to sign the best players for Barcelona. Sandro Rosell was right all the time…

Cacau, the Brazilian player who will most probably take a spot in Joachim Löw squad next summer, made his comeback after an injury problem and the game against Köln was his opportunity to demand a place in the selection against Barcelona. He is not a consistent player but when he is in the right set of mind he can cause lot of troubles.

Beside Cacau, Stuttgart will be counting on Pogrebnyak in the offense line. Regardless of Cacau hatrick hype, Pogrebnyak is the threat. He is a hell of a striker. He is not scoring for fun this season for Stuttgart, but he can create lot of spaces the way he moves upfront, his headers are clinical whether he is assisting or trying to score. Pique must keep an eye on him. If Barcelona contain the threat of this player, then things will go a bit easier.

THEN

The Hleb!

For not being exactly the popular player for Barcelona, the team has one of two choices:
1) Make sure to mark him well. If Stuttgart will have any intentions to move the ball smoothly forward feeding the offense, they will no doubt need the Help of Hleb. Our own dear player who will try to teach Pep a lesson or two.
2) Mark all Stuttgart players Beside Hleb. Let him score a Hattrick or two. Barcelona leaves the Champions league early but they get rid of Hleb permanently. No doubt Stuttgart will buy the player after the game if he led them to qualify.

So, is it better for Barcelona to qualify to the following round, or to get rid of Hleb? Tough call, I know…

Jens Lehmann is another name we know. Now you can bet on your good luck. Sometimes he is a Casillas, Buffon and Julio César mixed together (Which almost match the quality of Valdes?). He can save two shots targeting the two opposite angles of his goal and taken at the same time from the penalty spot. In some other days you don’t need to bother trying to score in his net, he will humbly do it for you.

On the down side (for them), they will miss the injured Arthur Boka. Molinaro is a decent replacement. Good job Barcelona, you send Caceres to Juventus so they can afford passing Molinaro to Stuttgart in return. Now Molinaro has to decide if he prefers getting outrun by Alves, or denied by Messi.

Barcelona Camp now:

After an “Ok Performance” against Racing, The team is yet to hit the peak performance, but there are plenty of good signs. Last weekend, Iniesta, Henry, and Marquez earned themselves a boost of moral, scoring crucial goals for the team. Yaya performance showed some positive signs as well and Maxwell is improving all the time. In an irregular occasion we saw the boy Bojan as a man who can. And Busquets demonstrated his quality once again, though as a box to box playmaking midfielder this time (Take that Cesc!). Barcelona prepares for this game with three big names joining the group, Ibra, Xavi and Alves. It’s yet to be seen if any of them will be ready to start in Germany, and it’s not a certainty yet that Messi will take the nod as well.

As an initial platform, my favorite selection is almost the same selection we started against Racing, with two little modifications: first one is a must, having Pedro instead of Bojan, and the other one is recommended, using Milito beside Pique. You get the following:

Valdes, Puyol, Pique, Milito, Maxwell, Yaya, Busquets, Iniesta, Pedro, Henry, Messi.

Marquez is a quality defender, but I don’t like to have two identical center backs partnering in the heart of the defense. That’s the main reason why I favor Milito over Marquez for this game. I doubt that Messi injury was that serious, he wasn’t substituted against Racing, though the signs of discomfort were obvious.

If all the players mentioned above will be available, then the selection will most probably be:

Valdes, Alves, Puyol, Pique, Maxwell, Yaya, Busquets, Xavi, Iniesta, Ibra, Messi.

Busquets will have to play in a more conservative way than he did against Racing, giving Yaya the chance to cover deeper, so that Maxwell and Alves move forward more often, contributing offense wise on the flanks. Having Xavi, Iniesta, Messi, and Ibra lead to dominating possession and Squeezing Stuttgart in their defense third for as long as possible.

If Pep decided to inject an additional Dose of scoring potentials for the offense line, going for an offense oriented approach rather than a possession oriented strategy, either Yaya or Busquets will be benched for either Pedro or Henry to play beside Ibra and Messi, with Iniesta moving back to the midfield.

I prefer keeping Henry and Pedro on the bench for the start. Playing on the road, it’s essential that we control possession first, absorb the hosts initial enthusiasm, make sure –by keeping the ball- that they don’t counter attack often while they are still fresh enough to do so, and try to get advantage of any defense mistake they may commit to score. Afterwards, we can modify our tactics using the game changers we have on the bench.

An upset will be a surprise. But this is the champions’ league. It may end up being similar to last season’s battle against Bayern, or will be as complicated as this season’s matches against Kazan. No doubt, Barcelona will have a message to send for the rest of Europe, and based on their performance in this game, future bets will be taken.

Everybody now: “For he’s a jolly good fellow… which nobody (not even Marca) can deny!”

After burying our dreams of an unbeaten season at the Calderón, it’s time to focus on keeping the distance with Real Madrid, who trail two points behind (so, that tingling sensation you’ve had all week? That was a madridista breathing down your neck). No more room for mistakes, slip-ups or days of poor concentration and poor aim. There’s a lot of Liga left, and this Saturday we meet Racing de Santander to show that we can still call ourselves champions.

And, following the epidemic of injuries and suspensions that forced us to battle with a patchwork team last weekend, this match will be determined by who returns… and who doesn’t.

Piqué and Márquez, having served their one-match suspension, are back and available to make our defence more than three men and a misplaced kid (no offence meant to Jeffren, who did what he could against Atlético). Since Thursday, Chygrinskiy and Yaya Touré have been training again with the rest of the team (though not with an official declaration of game-readiness), while Xavi and Dani Alves are still doing individual work with their trainers, and Abidal and Keita sit in a dark gym somewhere and mourn their fate.

Call me over-prudent or, more plainly, a coward, but after the attempt to force Dani back resulted in his new injury, I’d be very, very careful with those players the Barça medical team declare fit.

But, for once, we’re not the only ones who have important people missing (Xavi, we miss you already!). Racing doesn’t have many people in the infirmary, but three of their players (Munitis, Colsa and Tchité) are suspended for this week’s match after being shown some of those brightly-coloured cards during their match against Málaga. This, of course, has prompted the darling people over at Marca to proclaim that “Racing gives up before travelling to the Camp Nou”, insisting that the players had already given this week’s three points for lost and forced the referee to card them so that they could just focus on next week’s match against Almería; “the comments in get-togethers and web-forums have focused on criticising the players and coach for this,” Marca inform us, rubbing their grubby little paws in the face of another possible conspiracy.

But enough about Marca. Let’s talk about Racing, who sit at the 14th place in La Liga and who, although they were handed a recent defeat by Málaga (0-3 last weekend), managed to beat an Atlético de Madrid who had their Mr Hyde faces on during the return leg of the Copa del Rey semi-final (the aggregate, however, was still a mighty 6-3 in favour of the rojiblancos). Their star, who was signed by Real Madrid in Florentino Pérez’s latest shopping spree, is 19-year-old midfielder Sergio Canales, who reminds me of Bojan Krkic, in that he is cute and fresh-faced, but actually scores goals.

Here’s a little something so you can see Canales falling on his face as a child, and some cold-blooded finishing too…

“It’s always a pleasure to play against a team like FC Barcelona,” says Racing defender Christian, faithfully following the old saying about flattery. “But we do expect this to be an ungrateful match.” He then hurries to get in touch with recent events, admitting that “Barça’s game is not going through its most brilliant moment”, and then plays poor-little-me, that “the games against Barça are the ones in which you run the most, and touch the ball the least”.

In the meanwhile, in Can Barça…

After last week’s laughable defensive situation, with the return of Gerard Piqué and Rafa Márquez things look, if not well, at least less dire; I’m almost sure that Pep will give up on his plans of making a serviceable RB out of a striker too young to know better, and will make Puyol take his very solid self to that flank and leave Piqué and Gaby ‘Phoenix’ Milito to care after Valdés.

That was the easy part. Our main problem this time around is the midfield. Sure, we still have Andrés Iniesta and Sergi Busquets (who, contrary to some reports, is not suspended… apparently), but that leaves a big, Xavi-shaped hole in the middle. Who can we choose to fill it?

The options are varied and most of them leave me slightly queasy:

1) The Kamikaze, a.k.a. The Márquez/Piqué Variant: both Piqué (with Catalunya) and Márquez (under Rijkaard’s orders) have played DM, which would free our polyvalent ‘wonder’ Busquets to make mistakes further afield, and would turn the team into something rather more defensive than it usually is (and more mistake-prone, with both Rafa and Busi there). This can also happen with Chygrinskiy, should he be fully fit by Saturday.

2) The Experimental, a.k.a. The Dos Santos/Thiago Alternative: Pep has never shied away from bringing in promising youngsters to the team, and this might be the perfect opportunity to show off some of the midfield talent coming from La Masía. Johnny Dos Santos has already played, and performed well, with the first team, and there is a lot of expectation surrounding Thiago, so both are good options for this.

3) The Way Out There, a.k.a. The Messi Spinoff: Leo Messi is no stranger to the midfield, although of course, it’s not where he has done most of his miracles. Still, having him behind Ibrahimovic would definitely make Barça an attacking force to be reckoned with, even if it would, at the same time, make us weaker defensively. But hey, we could even give Bojan a start; how often can you say that?

What do I think? I think that Pep is going to surprise us all and come up with something that wouldn’t have occurred to me in centuries; perhaps playing Pinto as a DM? No, that is not experimental enough for Pep… but he’ll come up with something and *make* it work, I wager. If you have an idea, don’t hesitate to share it in the comments…

And yes, you’ll have noticed that Henry is a part of all my fancy hypothesis. After a week in which he played basket (unfortunately, all the handball jokes have already been used up) and dodged questions about his health and his relationship with Pep, I think it’s time to bring our Frenchman back from the dry dock and see if his time keeping Bojan company on the bench has been good for something. Pedrito, as adorable and effective as he might be, with his crooked smile and deadly finishing, performs better when brought on as a super-sub, which dovetails nicely with Henry getting winded after sixty or seventy minutes of play.

Anyway, even if Pep fields a team made up completely of canteranos, Spanish Football Federation President Villar and a limping Chygrynskiy, we have got to win; so pick up your Barça scarf, your tranquiliser of choice and come join us tomorrow (20:00 CET, 13:00 CST) as we LiveBlog our way to victory (we hope)!

You know what’s coming baby!

Now that I have managed to dig myself out of a few inches of snow, I have successfully navigated the long and arduous trip from my bed to my computer.

Right now in my Texas History class, we’re reading about Mexico’s attempts to keep Texas between the years of 1821-1836, where as you know Texas was ruled by Mexico after their successful rebellion from Spain. To chronicle these events plus many more, I am currently reading A Glorious Defeat by Timothy J. Henderson.

This reading takes the premise that Mexico was wrought with internal strife, a confused new found nation that is trying to find its identity. Promise soon turns to despair as young Mexico attempts to expand and thrive in an industrialist oriented world while maintaining her old cultural habits. The elites of Mexican society, would much prefer this, as they keep their economic and social status. This is juxtaposed against the poorer classes who want to be seen as equals and clamor for reform.

Atletico de Madrid reminds me much of this young Mexico. A club which shows promise but hinders themselves again and again, only for others to eventually exploit them. Silver mines being constantly exploited to serve regional, rather than national interests, caudillos (men who built regional power through kinship, charisma, patronage, control of economic resources) making personal armies to manipulate their influence and prestige for personal gain. This is sounds like an old cowboy’s tale, and as of late it looks at though Atletico Madrid reflects many of the issues that expanding Mexico had.

Madrid’s mental state is woeful at the moment. They drew to Racing 1-1 last week, and lost 0-2 to Malaga the week prior to that. On their day they can be as dangerous as any team in Europe, but those days are usually few and far between. They currently sit in an astonishing 13th position in the table, far from anywhere anyone was expecting them to be this year. With a front line of Kun Aguero and Diego Forlan, goals are not hard to come by, but when there is a starting back four of Ujfalusi – Perea – Domínguez – López, goals are not hard to concede either. 6 wins, 6 draws and 9 loses is where the Rojiblancos stand, behind teams like Mallorca, Getafe and Osasuna. They will need a desperately good result to right the ship and give them some confidence. Like young Mexico, although lacking in mental fortitude, they are still a dangerous opponent who on their day can storm that fucking Alamo.

Atletico can take solace though. No matter what happens, they win. They can either hold the best team in the world to a draw or produce a shock victory, or! They can lose to us, which is certainly not helping Real, which I’m sure every Atletico fan can appreciate. This is what you can expect to see from Atletico starting tomorrow:

De Gea
Ujfalusi – Perea – Domínguez – López
Assunçao – Tiago
Reyes ——— Simão
Agüero – Forlán

Kun Aguero always seems to up his game when playing against us. Bastard. As usual, it’s a match up of the two most talked about Argentine’s in the world today, Kun vs Leo.

And onto us.

Our sudden disappearance of anyone on the back line has numerous supporters worried. I am not however. We used a patch work defense against Manchester United in the Champions League final. That turned out real well . . .

Pictured: Where make shift defensive lines will take you, the agony of victory.

These players are professionals, and we have a professional look about us. This means that if Pep wants Keita to play LB, a position he apparently disdains (as I have been reading around on the interwebs, but can’t find anywhere where he’s said that himself) Keita will suck it up for one game and play LB for the good of the team. I personally want to see this:

Maxwell – Puyol – Milito – Keita

That is not a bad back line at all. Maxwell put in a great performance last week at RB against Getafe replacing Dani Alves, our superman who has become unusually human since his arrival to Barcelona (in terms of injuries suffered).

Some have mentioned Busquets to be played at CB, and make a back line of Puyol – Busquets – Milito – Maxwell. No. Busquets does not have the pace to keep up with Aguero nor the strength to hold off Forlan. He would be exposed for this pace at a fairly constant interval if he were to play there. DM will do him good, save any more horrid back passes straight to opposing players.

Xaviesta to occupy their usual roles in the middle, where both absolutely THRIVE in the openness of these kinds of games between Barça and Madrid. Look for these two to do the usual, dominate midfield and control the pace of the game. Everyone knows how this works by now, so going into further detail on this is moot.

Luckily for us, Leo Messi always manages to up his game against Atletico as well. He has 13 goals in 11 career games against Atletico, with the most recent encounter at Camp Nou resulting in another brace for our wonder man.

An interesting question arises though about our front line. More so at LWF than anywhere else. Henry or Pedro? Henry has been not doing so well health wise lately, but he is fit now. I advocate for his presence in the starting XI. He provides pressure on the left, something which Pedroad Runner does intermittingly. Use Pedro in that super sub role, coming on with fresh legs and enthusiastic eyes to kill off the game in the last 20 minutes when Henry has done his fair share and scored.

The full squad list: Valdés, Pinto, Bartra, Muniesa, Maxwell, Puyol, Milito, Keita, Xavi, Iniesta, Busquets, Jonathan, Ibrahimovic, Pedro, Bojan, Jeffren, Messi and Henry.

The starting XI I expect to see tomorrow:

Valdes
Maxwell – Puyol – Milito – Keita
Busquets
Xavi – Iniesta
Messi – Ibrahimovic – Henry

I for one want us to go the entire season undefeated, it will just add to the lore of this historic squad. Placing Muniesa and Bartra in starting positions puts us at great liability. If we have the game in hand, like the 6-0 drubbing we gave them three seasons ago, then sure bring them on. In a close game, which I think this will be, we will have no room for error.

Speaking of 6-0. . .there are a lot of statistics to be looked at overall.

The past two years unfortunately we have started off well, but both times Atletico came back to win (2-4 in 2008, 3-4 in 2009). The last few meetings of these two teams in the Calderon as well as overall are as follows:

09/10 La Liga: Barcelona 5, Atletico Madrid 2
08/09 La Liga: Atletico Madrid 4, Barcelona 3
08/09 Copa del Rey: Barcelona 2, Atletico Madrid 1
08/09 Copa del Rey: Barcelona 3, Atletico Madrid 1
08/09 La Liga: Barcelona 6, Atletico Madrid 1
07/08 La Liga: Atletico Madrid 4, Barcelona 2
07/08 La Liga: Barcelona 3, Atletico Madrid 0
06/07 La Liga: Barcelona 6, Atletico Madrid 0

We have scored 30 goals in the past 8 games against Atletico for a GPG average of 3.75. Astounding. Conversely Atletico’s GPG average stands at 1.625. Rounding up! one can expect 6 goals to be scored tomorrow. Doubt it, but it is interesting to note in the past three league meetings there have been 7 goals in each game. Looking deeper though past recent history, our visits to the Vicente Calderon do have cause for alarm: In our 72 meetings to that ground, Atletico have 36 wins to our 18, with 18 draws. There has only been one 0-0 draw EVER in the Spanish capital between these two clubs, that coming in the 03/04 season. They have 132 goals in these 72 matches to our 107. The past 10 years we have visited, those crazy red and whites have 5 victories, 3 draws and just 2 defeats. Hopefully we can strike another one in the defeat column for them tomorrow.

I for one am expecting us to take the day in what has become a customary high scoring affair. It will be close, so perhaps a 3-2 or 4-3 scoreline in our favor? Goals from Messi (2), Henry and Xavi.

Game start: 2pm CST (US) on 2/14/10

So there you go, a glimpse of what is to come tomorrow. I will see you all on the other side.

OMFG, A PREVIEW!

A couple of months into the season and the talk of the town was still about whether Josep could replicate an insurmountable yesterseason. Of course, the presence of buzzards could also not be ignored, keenly pointing out the replacement of sure-fire Eto’o for Swedish question mark Ibrahimovic among other points of critique.

Now, half way into the season, it’s definitive that Josep won’t be able to replicate his previous trifecta as Sevilla mustered up enough goals and hung on at the edge of the cliff for dear life long enough to see Barcelona ousted from the Copa Del Rey.

The situation though remained swell. A verbal agreement to extend his contract, left Guardiola worriers with a recovered spring in their step. The clockwork performances and results have also rolled in during league action, as the club has experienced rather strange midweek hiatuses. You know, those mid week days that were normally reserved for sweat, goals and tiki taka.

But all good things come to an end, right?

And with the tabloids so wound up between Guti’s new found ‘Heel of God ( a good chance of pace from his well known Achille’s heel) and the hush hush err… shout shout ‘Villarato‘ campaign, the printing press might just explode in Spanish sensationalism if Barcelona take a knee when Getafe visit this Saturday.

OK, perhaps it isn’t entirely wise to bet on a Barcelona loss, but there’s good reasoning that might make this game the only loss Barcelona will experience against a Madrid side all season.

I suppose it’s only natural to start with the tallest big bird in the squad. Ibrahimovic’s recent misaligned shooting technique has gotten a fair share of people wondering what’s up? Like an old wise Spiderman, Cruyff’s sixth sense has quickly led to a column outlining the fact that Ibrahimovic, and to a lesser extent Henry, have contributed more than enough to the Barcelona dynamic. Rumor has it Johan then curled his hand into a fist, placed it into a velvet glove and reminded column readers that a forward’s duty does not start or stop with goals.

Point taken, Johan but that still doesn’t bode the best for Barcelona. The way Michel has been driving his team, 90 minutes of Ibrahimovic misses might just do the team in.

Not if Pedro has anything to say about it. Now, a part of me would have wanted to replace Pedro with Bojan in that sentence but circumstances dictate otherwise. Pedro, has been continuing his fantastic contributions with guile and goals. While no one wants a good secret to be spoiled by exposure, it feels as if Pedro may once again find his way onto the score sheet against Getafe. A couple of more goals may just mean a nice contract renewal which may just give him enough money for braces, or fake dentures. Something to fix that smile for future goal celebrations.

Speaking of things that need fixing, Barcelona will have to sort out Gefate with a less than complete defensive line up. Puyol misses out due to the yellow card accumulation rule while Abidal and Dani Alves remain doubtful for the match.

Does this mean? No it can’t!

Chy….

Chy….

Chygrynskiy is set for some actual minutes? Well the opportunity certain has presented it self. Between the Puyol suspension and his recent words of struggle and perseverance to the media, this would be a nice stage for the Ukrainian to set the record straight. Or, at least make some head way.

Not surprisingly, since declaring Dani Alves doubtful nary a minute ago he’s back on the trot and is presumed ‘normal’ per Barcelona’s official site. Super human or Super Sonic the Hedgehog? You decide.

Regardless, Guardiola will open up the youngster Albert Dalmau to earn a spot in the squad list. Muniesa and him have spent the week training with the big boys, but it remains to be seen whether Muniesa makes the squad list against Getafe.

Surely, Getafe’s historical idol Real Madrid will be all too buoyant should Getafe squeak a win. Ordinarily, i’d dismiss it but Getafe’s recent teeter totter form doesn’t help things. Having only recently discovered the bittersweet virtue of a draw, they still have to contest second leg of their semi-final CDR match up against Sevilla.

Maybe, just maybe Villar will show up and score the game winning goal for us. You never can tell.

Gentlemen, one of these will improve your performance.

But back to what really concerns us, which is this season, Saturday will see us visit Sporting de Gijón, to start the second half of La Liga, after having gone through the first half unbeaten.

Sporting sit at a comfortable 10th place in La Liga, with less than half the points of Barça (24 to our 49), and six wins, six draws and seven losses to their name. Their numbers at home are a little better (five wins, three draws and two losses), but nothing to tell us that El Molinón is a stronghold to the level of Sánchez Pizjúan or San Mamés. And let’s not forget that last time we visited Gijon, in September 2008, we achieved a modest 1-6 win (Xavi (27’), Eto’o (32’), Jorge (49’, o.g.), Maldonado (50’), Iniesta (70’), Messi (85’ and 88’)).

“It’s not a life-or-death match,” said Manolo Preciado, trying to save face. “To play against Barça is a true delight and we’ll try to enjoy it as much as possible.” I almost thought he’d segue in to say, “Anyway, participation is important, not winning”.

And how about us? Well, I have bad news for you. This is the group that will fly tomorrow morning to Gijón: Valdés, Pinto, Chygrynskiy, Piqué, Márquez, Milito, Puyol, Abidal, Maxwell, Touré, Sergio, Iniesta, Xavi, Messi, Pedro, Bojan, Henry and Ibrahimovic.

Read the list again. Are you missing someone?

Dani Alves. Yes, our Steel Hummingbird felt pain in the calf of his right leg during the last training session and hobbled to the physios only to be told that he wouldn’t be able to play this weekend. (I have the feeling that the physios did this only to keep their job, since yesterday they had proclaimed fit the only Barça player who was in their hands, Jeffren, and they must hate to sit by idly).

Sadly, we won’t see such fine crosses into the box… oh, excuse me, such fine goals and the ensuing celebrations this weekend.

So, with our right flank suddenly and heartbreakingly orphaned, what are our options? Well, we have two. One is to play Puyol on the right and choose either Milito or Márquez to keep Piqué company at the heart of our defence (I’d go with Milito, after Márquez’s unimpressive performances lately). The other is what Pep experimented with during an early Copa del Rey match, with Maxwell playing RB and Abidal playing LB. Our captain has always performed well, in whichever position he has had to play, but he excels as a fullback, especially with Piqué by his side, and I’d be loath to give that up, whilst I’m all in favour of giving Maxwell an opportunity to play, even if it is out of position.

Speaking of Maxwell, he gave an interview this week where he said that “Abidal is having an fantastic season and deserves his place in the starting XI” (maybe Maxwell reads this blog? If so, hi there, Maxwell!), but that he will still try to “do his best to impress the coach”.

The second question mark hovers over our midfield. With Keita suspended thanks to the yellow card he picked up against Valladolid, we have the usual Iniesta—-???—-Xavi conundrum. Yaya Touré returned to Barcelona on Thursday and trained with the rest of the team on Friday, while Sergi Busquets has started to participate in the training sessions on Monday and was given the all-clear to play yesterday. I’m on Team Yaya, but I’d play Sergi tomorrow. Why? Because we saw last weekend, with ‘Golden Boot’ Keita, that taking a player freshly arrived from the African Cup and throwing him into a match does not give good results. Call it jetlag, loss of familiarity or whatever, but I wouldn’t want this to happen to us tomorrow.

And the third question comes when we talk about our attack. The Henry—Ibrahimovic—Messi trident has now become far from unquestionable, with Henry being less than impressive lately (although he has had moves, one or two per match, which really deserved to be goals) and Ibrahimovic suffering from a streak of iffy matches. Fans of either player will surely say that benching them will do nothing for their confidence and that they only need an opportunity, but we have two nice, young strikers on the bench who also deserve playing minutes.

They look so happy, the little darlings! Wouldn't you let them play from time to time?

Pedrito, at least, is our favoured Super-Sub, being brought on whenever Barça needs a boost of energy or a goal, but Bojan is getting less and less minutes as the season wears on and our Copa del Rey race came to an abrupt end. When asked about it yesterday, he cheerfully said that he wants “to keep on growing at Barça” and that he’s ready to “help the team whenever the coach needs me to, and make the best of any opportunity I’m given”. “I wouldn’t say it’s fair or unfair” he added, when pressed to weigh on his scarce playing time. “The team has many players and a coach who makes the decisions, and I have to respect that”.

Is Gijón the right place to give Bojan a shot at playing football? Should Pedrito be given the chance to prove that he can be more than an emergency substitute? Or do Henry and Zlatan deserve to play until they regain their best level?

Personally, I’d give a chance to Bojan, in place of Henry, and keep Ibra at it until he scores, shakes off his goal funk and goes back to being ‘molto contento’; and, who knows, maybe someday he’ll learn not to be offside every two minutes and that Spanish refs will frown at his high-kicking the ball away from rival players.

So, my proposed line-up looks like this:

——————-Valdés——————–
Maxwel—-Puyol—Piqué—-Abidal
——————Busquets——————
————-Xavi——-Iniesta————–
—-Messi—-Ibrahimovic—-Bojan——

And I predict a comfortable, if not spectacular, win, with Ibra finally finding the back of the net.

My money is on a 1-4. And yours?

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Oh, and before I forget, The Offside has been nominated in the 2010 Bloggies as Best Sports Weblog, which means you can vote for all of us here. The Offside has also been nominated as Best Football Community for the 2009 Soccerlens Awards, which means that if you vote here, you’ll be voting for us, for yourselves and for the people that contradict you in the comments section!

I have never seen so many people fall on a pitch before. It wasn’t just the players from Barcelona, Valladolid players too were slipping the entirety of the match. It was weird to see. I don’t know if it was the pitch or the boots, because if it was the boots, I am sufficiently confident in our technical staff that they would have boots with longer studs to replace the ones that clearly were not adequate enough to handle the playing surface, and yet in the second half the same types of slipping continued to occur. On more than one occasion, this almost led to disaster for both sides.

Anyways, to the actual game. Having a week to prepare a fully healthy squad means that if you’re not one of the best XI that Guardiola can put out there, chances are you’re not going to get to play this weekend. This was the case yesterday, as we put onto the pitch: Valdes, Alves, Pique, Puyol, Abidal, “Golden Boot” Keita, Xaviesta, Henry, Ibrahimovic, Messi. So much for the experimentation at DM, Keita was thrown in right from the start.

Yet again, as seems to be the new tactic against us this season, teams run out of the gates trying to hit us early so they can sit back and absorb the pressure with a 1-0 lead. And again, we were unable to cope with this opening response, with some nervous opening minutes to the game. An Abidal foul in the 5th minute allowed a dangerous set piece which Valdes did well to palm out on the incoming cross.

Our first chance of the game came in the 11th minute when a Messi/Alves (sound familiar) combination lead to a good Messi shot that was well saved by Justo Villar, Sergio Asenjo’s replacement. That was the exception though the first 20 minutes, as we were put under heavy pressure by Valladolid. At least this makes for more exciting games this season as compared to last, competition wise. It was just a matter of time though before we slapped ourselves and decided to stop dangling the carrot in front of the donkey. The goal appeared in a non-typical Barça way of scoring however, via the counter.

Valladolid, pressing against us were interrupted when one Seydou “Golden boot” Keita won the ball, who played to Pique, who then played to Iniesta.

Iniesta beat his marker (who fell to the ground, unsurprisingly) grounded the ball to Xavi who back heeled it to Messi who laid the ball off to Alves. It was off to the races, with 12 players running at Villar, seven Valladolid and five Barcelona players. Imagine having to keep track of everyone’s position, when the ball is off to your side! In any case, Alves sought out Xavi in the middle of the box who finished with an exquisite volley. From end to end in 14 seconds. Amazing stuff.

One minute later, the game was finished. Alves, another bombing run down the flank crossed it into Ibra who made no mistake from 6 yards out with another perfectly placed volley! the goal and then it was 2-0. A ridiculously ugly looking celebration attracted the scorn of the Valladolid faithful, who proceeded to boo Alves the rest of the match.

From then on, you could see that Valladolid accepted the result of the match. An inevitable result. The second half began and once again Valladolid came out with fire and fervor, but not with much depth to their attacking, and we absorbed the pressure once again, more easily than in the first half.

In the 56th minute though, the heart was taken out of the body. Abidal regresses play with a pass to Puyol, who beats his marker (who falls unsurprisingly) and gets it to Iniesta, who lobs a ball 30 yards to Alves on the right. Making a diagonal run across the defense, Ibra beats the defense, and also his first touch by nearly gifting a perfect Alves pass out of bounds. He however collects himself and the ball near the end line, where he spots Messi’s run into the box, and lays off the ball with the precision of an US Marine Recon element for Messi to blast into the roof of the net.

Messi’s celebrations make me giggle. He doesn’t even celebrate anymore. Just a shrug of the shoulders of “yeah, I’m the best in the world, what’s it to you?” You feel as though he truly needs to do something magnificent for him to feel challenged, which he attempted to do a couple of times during the game. For instance, attempting to dribble three players (which to be honest, did nearly succeed) and score is probably not the smartest thing to do when you have someone waiting for you to square the ball to. Or when our tireless African is making a darting run into the box, a shot from a severe angle probably isn’t going to go into the net, no matter how many different ways you can bend your foot.

Someone may have something to say about you being the best. . .

Valdes made a few more stops here and there, and generally played excellently. Saved a bullet of a shot from a Pique handball that hurt my hands just watching. Came out when required to, and was a dominatraix overall. After the two goals in two minutes, our play was generally fantabulous (patent pending, bitchesssss).

And so we move on, undefeated the first half of the season, another new record. Can we go the distance and do what the Invincibles of Arsenal did in 2003/2004 (26 wins, 12 draws in the English Premier League)? Only time will tell, but I for one have a sneaking suspicion that we can do it. After all, who at this time last season thought we’d win the treble? Almost no one. We are apparently big fans of doing the impossible, which is precisely why I think we can and will do it.

Anywhoo, time for some ratings, my scale is from 1 to 5. 1 = Horrible, terrible effort, 2 = Poor game, 3 = average game, 4 = good game, 5 = great game:

Team 4: Another slow start, another slow momentum builder, and then we unleashed the dogs of war and the hounds of fury after which, we became quite docile again. I’d like to see another game where we put up three or four goals in the first 20 minutes.

Guardiola 3: Maybe didn’t need to field the best of the best, but I suppose he’s just thinking about crunch time when we need our best players working in tandem together. With the match killed off, would have liked to see Chiggy and Bojan to get more than 11 and 7 minutes of playing time, respecitvely.

Valdes 5: Pretty much a beast. Several key saves and he was very lively coming out for the ball. Domination, mang.

Alves 5 (MOTM): A hand in all three goals, sublime attacking play, dangerous crosses all game long. One or two lapses on the defensive end but no where near enough to detract from an almost perfect performance as you’re going to see from a RB.

Puyol 5: It was Puyol or Alves for MOTM. Captain Fantastic continued his great form by snuffing out attacks at the last, and being everywhere at once, he set an example of how to get it done, especially with Pique having an off day.

Pique 2: Homeboy didn’t have the best of days. Experiencing a dip in form, which may allow for the likes of Milito and Marquez to get a sniff at some of the first team action. His lack of pace was exposed on more than one occasion tonight.

Abidal 3: Not as dominating as last weeks performance against Sevilla, but our Frenchy did well enough. A quiet, solid evening from the LB.

Keita 4: Put in a very good performance, with this being his first match and all back from the ACN. Crushed attacks in our half, and was always an open outlet for whoever had the ball, no matter where the ball was. A gift that few know how to receive and even more importantly, use.

Xavi 5: I don’t know how he does it. I really don’t. Flawless first touch, flawless decisions, flawless goal.

Iniesta 4: Put in a good match, if even one of the more quieter ones that he’s had. Ghostface wasn’t as attacking as he usually is, but his midfield distribution was superb.

Henry 4: If only that bicycle kick had gone it, it would have been the icing on the cake for a great performance from Titi. Lively on the left again, and put a few decent shots on target. Would like to see him score though, his drought is even longer than Ibrahimovic’s.

Ibrahimovic 3: Score, please. Please score. Nice assist to Messi, but man your first touch is awful as of late. Makes up for it though in good decisions, and we didn’t see him get overly frustrated. A couple offsides prevented what would have been 1v1 goal scoring opportunities.

Messi 4: Another easy goal, but it looks like he’s getting bored out there on the pitch sometimes. Anyone else agree? His recent tendency to get disinterested in matches has cost the team a couple goals. Good thing we have several goals in us a match, otherwise this would become more of a glaring issue.

Subs:

Milito 3: The Argentine did well in the back, I want him to start a game, that would please me immensely, he still obviously has the quality to be a consistent first teamer for us.

Chigrynskiy N/A: I feel when players get 10 minutes or less on the pitch they don’t have enough time to make an impact on the game generally. Especially games like this where the result is already a conclusion.

Bojan N/A: Seven minutes is usually not enough to get into the flow and rhythm of a game.
Another free midweek for us in which to prepare for our next match, against Sporting Gijon next weekend. Another three points in the bag, or at least should be.

Apologies for having the review up late, after the game I went home to see my dearest mother, whose birthday was yesterday.

And as always, I leave you with something happy to think about in your daily travels:

I suppose it’s only fair to point out that the only point difference that is currently greater than a hairbreadth belongs to Atletico Madrid who have a hold on 11th place by three points over Osasuna. From then on down, it’s more or less a blindfolded battle royale. And while everyone is busy flailing their fists hoping to hit their nearest rivals to ensure a safe mid table spot, Xerez seem to quickly be disappearing into the relegation super massive black hole six points off the pace of La Liga’s second worst team, Real Zaragoza.

Talk about outdated. Yes, that’s Asenjo in a Vallodolid outfit. And yes, that’s Hleb in a Barcelona outfit. Rest assured, Hleb did not score that chance and it has nothing to do with Asenjo, moreover it probably had something to do with that stupendous facial expression Aleksandr is sporting.

Naturally, this leaves Valladolid coach Jose Luis Mendilibar sweating. Perhaps a bit more than his counterpart Josep Guardiola, who’s only recent problem has been that 500 pound gorilla jumping on his shoulders whilst waving an unsigned contract. I suppose it’s nice to have problems that stem off of how good you’ve been. Must be the stuff that Mendilibar’s dreams are made of.

Surprisingly, Jose didn’t flee to Africa to assume a life of quiet under a different identity. Instead he had to put up with endearing harassment on his birthday when he attended a concert in Barcelona. Between the girl with thick framed glasses wishing an off-key happy birthday to Jose and the duet couple trying their best to place their wishes of having Josep renew into a harmonious tune, Josep was hit with an epiphany.

Agree to the contract, allow the world to rejoice, and politely remind Laporta that the team does indeed have a mid-season’s duel to attend to in Valladolid. While Laporta was busy setting himself up for alley-oop quips about yesterseason’s 2-6 thrashing, Josep was surveying the conference room for the quickest point of exit.

And for good reason too. While future Golden Boot winner Keita makes his physical return from the African Cup of Nations in time for the weekend match, it’s not expected that Josep will drop the rather doe-eyed midfielder onto the pitch. Ordinarily this wouldn’t be a problem, even with Yaya Toure moonlighting as a EPL aficionado while on ACN duty. Cases like these simply require the services of the lanky yet collapsible Busquets. While his agonizing rendezvous with grass on any given match doesn’t result in serious injuries, he apparently cannot escape the wraith of kidney bruises. So too, his counterpart Puyol remains in doubt with back pains. Normally, this is simply a sign that Puyol should trim his golden locks a bit. In any case, the captain is likely to cozy up on the bench.

What does that leave Josep with? Well, it leaves him with a useless Big Bird up front who has admitted to being not just bad recently but, ‘bad, bad, bad’. No worries, A hat-trick should rectify the problem. In fact, while Josep must make do with a off-color Zlatan, the presence of Messi, Pedro and Henry should atleast ensure a goal or two or four.

The true conundrum involves the aforementioned midfield problem where Josep will have the luxury of choosing between two tree trunks: A Mexican tree trunk, and a Ukranian tree trunk. While we’ve seen how the Mexican version works, everyone appears to be rather curious as to how the Ukranian would get along. At the very least, if not to test out his midfield abilities, then just to catch a glimpse of what 25 million Euros gets you nowadays.

The good news about this puzzle problem is that we’re likely to see ol’ Gabriel Milito back in the fray. Who deserves no less than some minutes after quietly going about his re-introduction to competitive football with some rust-free performances.

Josep intends to do Mendilibar no favours on Saturday but as always he’s cooled the waters with cautionary words. It wasn’t too long ago that Barcelona had to sweat out a tricky 15 minutes away to Tenerife. While that bubble was quickly deflated with a cavalcade of goals, Josep knows that things could’ve been much more trickier had Tenerife struck the back of the net, not the crossbar. A Barcelona win is at hands, but don’t expect a relaxing stroll through wine country.

Luckily for Josep, he’ll still have his renewal even if points are dropped. The same can’t be said for Mendilibar.

She’s that girl you see every day at school, and she vexes you to no end. She likes you and might even be pretty cute, but she lacks of personality and her intelligence level insults even the most intellectually inept creatures. Yet, you must press on, having to endure her until thankfully, the Summer Break comes, and you get away from her, if even it is only for three months. Until you get to that break however, you will be tormented of the thoughts of days lost and time wasted.

This is what many Barcelona fans must feel about Sevilla, a squad that has us most angry, and according to some reports devastated to the point of emotional breakdown. And who can blame them? Barcelona dominated Sevilla on Wednesday, only to go crashing out of the Copa del Rey 2-2 on the away goals rule. A deity type performance from Andres Palop saw multiple good efforts saved, and not even the best of the best (us) could beat down the barrier sufficiently enough to make it to the round of 8, unlike Atletico Madrid, who overcame a 0-3 start against Recreativo to win 5-4 on agg in the Vicente Calderon. Good match, that one. Alas, I digress. We are a passionate folk, and don’t take too kindly to defeat.

This means bad things for Sevilla, more of which will be discussed below. . .

We have an entirely healthy roster, and except for our two Africans away on international duty (which may not be for much longer, if neither Mali nor the Ivory Coast make it past the group stage) everyone is present and available for selection. Being that we just played Sevilla no more than three days earlier for the game tomorrow, much of the tactics that we applied to that game should be applied to this game. The XVIII available players to be picked have not been selected yet, but I have a feeling we may see something like this:

Valdes, Pinto, Puyol, Pique, Abidal, Maxwell, Busquets, Iniesta, Xavi, Henry, Messi, Ibra, Bojan, Pedro, Milito, Alves, Marquez, Chigrynskiy.

My predicted starting XI for the game:

Valdes
Puyol – Marquez – Pique – Abidal
Busquets
Xavi – Iniesta
Messi – Ibra – Pedro

Alves stayed in Seville the day after the match so will have one fewer day of practice with the rest of the team. Knowing Pep’s meticulous pre game preparations, he will have Puyol start on the right with Alves ready to explode off the bench if necessary:

Henry is getting up there in age, so we should think about conserving him so that he is at his most lethal when he is available. And he is at his most lethal when he is rested and brimming with energy and itching to get out there and play. If only we could sneak someone on the near post to finish his only remaining move in his now depleted bag of tricks (the drag to the left and cross into the box). Plus, Pedro has shown the goods almost every time he has gone out to play for us this season, Mr. Clutch is one of those rare breeds who is always in the right place at the right time.

Of course, Bojan who streaks worse than an improperly cleaned windshield, has been hitting his form lately, evidenced by his three assists (all to Messi, curiously) against Tenerife. He was put on the last few minutes midweek against Sevilla, but he was barely on the pitch long enough to make any sort of impact.

Ibrahimovic must bounce back at home against Sevilla. He was neutralized completely and totally on Wednesday, and was most justifiably removed from the game in the 81st minute on Wednesday. He gets fouls called on him constantly for using his big physic, and is visibly frustrated numerous times during numerous games. I have something to tell you buddy: get over it. Defenders are going to harass you, you are going to get kicked and pulled and life is going to be a bitch. It’s the same for everyone else on the team as well, and they carry on and get the job done. Don’t take it personal, it’s your job, so do it. Our most expensive signing ever, act like it. Show yourself to be a model example for the younger blokes on the squad.

On Sevilla’s end of things, they’re all hunky dorry. Handing us our first Cup defeat in 21 months has left Sevilla feeling elated. Manolo Jiminez, the Sevilla manager said this at his press conference yesterday, “The victories are pain relievers, you forget the beatings and everything. Motivates you, and that should be our best guarantee. If we were able to eliminate them, we can repeat it, but we know that are very good. We’ve shown that we beat anyone, but also lose to anybody. ”

I like Jiminez, he is a humble man who has his squad sitting pretty in 5th place in La Liga, one point below Deportivo and 5 below third placed Valencia. All the players that were available for Wednesday’s match are also going to be available for the game tomorrow.

There are some concerns from Seville that the players may be suffering from fatigue. This appeared apparent, especially the last thirty minutes of Wednesday’s game when they absolutely bombarded the box with players, shots, machine guns, grenades, tanks, everything. If we can get some lesser quality players of theirs in the game, or keep some of the fatigued players in, we can wear them down, especially if we strike quickly in the first half. The list of 19 players, one of which will be dropped on Saturday is as follows:

Palop, Javi Varas, Konko, Stankevicius, Escude, Cala, Dragutinovic, Fernando Navarro, Adriano, Lolo, Marc Valiente, Duscher, Renato, Romaric, Jesús Navas, José Carlos, Koné, Diego Capel Negredo

This is critical and essential. The Camp Nou fans will be behind us, I expect a lot of home support, and fans to gather to push us on. With this confidence, and the thoughts of one less trophy in the cabinet this year, we will be out for blood-thirsty revenge. I’m hoping for a repeat of the 4-0 demolition they experienced at our hands this past April. To get a good goal early will relax us, allow tiki-taka to take over and dominate, forcing Sevilla to play our game, which no one else in the world can play. That is what is unique about this club and is what puts us above the rest.

We shall overcome.