Barca 1, Espanyol 2, a.k.a. “And then it was 7.”

By: Kevin | February 21st, 2009

Ye gods, this one felt bad going in. That we let a match of football degenerate into a knife fight means that we deserved what we got, which was a loss.

Espanyol came in 20th in the table. As in rock bottom. As in a one hair off a dog’s ass away from relegation unless they stage a remarkable comeback. And what better time to start than against the top of the table, right, a team that was on the ropes in at their home, requiring a last-gasp penalty to get the win, right? Right?

Right.

My summation of this one can be brief: We didn’t man up, and we didn’t play football, choosing instead to spend all of our time trying to curry favor with the ref, instead of just putting this team away as we should have.

The good thing is that there is lots of culpability to go around here.

The starting XI was good and optimistic: Valdes, Alves, Pique, Marquez, Abidal, Yaya, Keita, Xavi, Henry, Eto’o, Messi. Should have been enough to more than dispatch a struggling defensive side, right?

Not so fast.

Of late, we’ve started to look like last year’s side, in keeping possession until the real danger time comes, giving up a couple of stupid goals, then mounting the “close but no cigar” comeback. And the trends aren’t encouraging, as we are struggling against teams that we should be putting to bed with a blanky and four or five goals, before the half.

But things are different, because it’s a tired side you’re looking at. So everybody holds the ball for too long, passes aren’t as crisp as they once were, the runs aren’t as sharp. Everyone is a footstep away, and it’s a critical one. So the balls that found teammates on the dead run early in the season, are now finding the feet of a defender, or the ball is squirting through to open space, with the runner coming up just short.

It’s a critical difference that accounts for a lot of why we’re been struggling. A week of rest, quite frankly, isn’t enough when the lads are this tired. And the squad depth is suddenly not there, as Hleb, Keita and Krkic aren’t panning out to be what we expected, which was ways to give the likes of Iniesta, Xavi, Henry and Eto’o some quality rest.

So they play….and play….and play. Then Espanyol comes to town, full of hope and energy, and steals one. More correctly, we gave them one. Yes, we pinged the ball around, yes we played much of the first half in their end of the pitch. But really, we never looked like scoring. Ray-Ray can rant all he wants about that Messi cross to Henry early in the half, but by the time that lob got to Henry’s head, Kameni and a defender were there. Ray-Ray needs to cool the hyperbole, but he won’t. Guaranteed.

More worrisome are the missed runs and bad control, all signs of fatigue. The other sign of fatigue, injury, is also cropping up. To be fair, the Evil Empire had its bad spell in the sick bay, and we made hay while the sun shined. Now it appears to be their turn, as a Betis side that we had to come back from two goals down against got spanked 6-1 in the Bernabeu.

Anybody remember those scorelines?

And I’m sure that people will argue all they want about the referee, and the ball being played directly out, and the red card that shouldn’t have been, etc, etc. None of it should have come to that. Espanyol played their hearts out, then got into our heads. We earned the loss, as plain as day.

For my money, the game turned when Abidal went out with the groin injury, and it’s an 8-9 week comeback from that one. Ouch. Ouch, ouch, ouch. That meant that Puyol came in at left back, and it showed for Espanyol’s first goal, as nobody seemed to know what to do. Abidal’s pace means that 3 men back on counterattacks is easy, even if Busquets sticks a foot out to deflect the pass directly to an Espanyol attacker to kick-start their break.

With Puyol in there, as lion-like as his heart is, he’s stuck between a rock and a hard place, not really knowing who to defend and not having the pace to shade the difference. And Yaya, inexplicably, stopped running with the man he was marking, who opened up to score the goal. If Yaya stays home, the goal doesn’t happen because the passer is covered, with nowhere to put the ball.

The second was just an awful mistake from a keeper who in fact played a hell of a match. But those two critical errors are the difference between a 1-0 win and a 2-1 loss, aren’t they? They are also errors that we weren’t making during the run of good, excellent and yes, lucky play that marked the first half of the season for us.

So. Is the league still over? No. With Atletico away next week, and no Abidal, suddenly the pace of the likes of Sinama-Pongolle is distressing. Yet even more distressing is that like last season, we’re dropping points to teams that we aren’t suppposed to be dropping points to. Yes, teams play out of their minds when they play against us. Duh! That’s part of being top.

Am I worried? No. I’m more worried about Abidal. Not being able to walk off the pitch is bad. Really bad. And he’s as critical a part of our side as any attacker or midfielder.

And with that, onward:

Team: 2. They had the opportunity to take the match in hand and put it away in the first half, when Espanyol were on the back foot and just hanging on. Matters were made worse by all the falling down, fouling and letting the opponent get into their heads. Stupid. Yes, the ref sucked. Play through it.

Guardiola: 2. He should have had this team coming out breathing fire. Busquets for Henry? Yes, Henry was playing like crap, but how is Busquets going to improve that attacking situation? The Gudjohnsen for Eto’o sub was also not very inspired, because it meant that we were playing with no forwards, as in zero. Messi isn’t a forward. He let the game get out of control, and didn’t know how to get it back this time.

Valdes: 6. Yes, people are going to howl. But except for that one misplaced clearance, where did he go much wrong? Now he will take a lot of weight for that blunder because it was huge. As in ginormous. No was a 10-man side is coming back from 2-0 down. His concentration should have been sharper than ever.

Alves: 7. Played a hell of a match. Very active on offense and defense. Not his fault people weren’t getting it done at the business end of his passes. He was about the only one who was able to give-and-take with Espanyol and not get out of his game.

Pique: 6. A very strong match for him, as well. Yes we lost and conceded twice, but he actually played well. Pique was all over the place on offense and defense, bringing the ball up, making smart passes and covering well.

Marquez: 4. He hasn’t been the same since coming back from the injury.

Abidal: incomplete. Was on his way to a spectacular match when the injury happened. That’s a tough loss. Early word is a torn abductor muscle in the thigh, out for 8-9 weeks.

Yaya: 4. Alternately active and sluggish. His non-covering of the Espanyol attacker was huge. As in match-turning.

Xavi: 3. Yes, the standard for him is very high. But not in recent memory has he so consistently not lived up to it. He’s just off, on passes, shots, free kicks, you name it.

Keita: 2. No, it wasn’t a red card. Can’t see that one surviving examination by the Liga. But he still sucked. I can’t figure him out. I know what we thought we were buying, but what we have so far is a “t’ain’t,” as in “t’ain’t a real good DM, but t’ain’t a real good attacker, either.”

Messi: 4. No real influence, and he looked tired. He also held the ball too long, and lacks that pinball-like verve that made him so unplayable. Again. Fatigue.

Henry: 2. He is supposed to show up for matches such as this one, as the big-time, veteran presence. I’m sure he knows why he tried to play in Keita, instead of just lifting the ball over Kameni for the 1-0 lead. And while the Messi header took forever to get there, he has to attack that ball, meeting it halfway. He was also lining up offside, and not bothering to get back, another sign on a tired player.

Eto’o: 2. No influence on the match, just like the rest of his front line mates. He let his man take him completely out of the game, so he spent all of his time with the ball bouncing off of his foot, arguing with the ref or bumping against various Espanyol players. Which helps the side how?

Substitutions

Puyol (for Abidal): 4. He played his heart out, but he still isn’t up to full speed. He was coming forward a lot, without the pace to get back. He also should have been more decisive on the first Espanyol goal.

Busquets (for Henry): 3. Here’s the thing, Sergi: If you can’t actually control the ball, sometimes you’re better off just letting it roll past you, rather than throwing off a touch that steers the ball directly to an attacker, starting the opponents’ counterattack.

Gudjohnsen (for Eto’o): 4. Not bad, but he had what could have been two excellent opportunities, but his match-reading was poor, so he was always a step late. The Busquets glancing header could have been an easy tap-in goal, but he was a step away.

Edit: I just noticed that there were some EE fans who visited the preview thread to talk smack. It’s all in fun but you know what? Where were you when the shoe was on the other foot, contributing to discussions in this space even though we were up and you were down? Many of us from this space (me, Ramzi, Isaiah, Hector and a few others), were being positive and contributing to discussions in the EE space when the shoe was on the other foot. But to sashay in and kick a side when it’s down is just bullshit. Yes, I said it. Bullshit.