Recreativo 2, Barca 2, a.k.a. “Kxevin is speechless”

By: Kevin | April 12th, 2008

Alternate Messi

Good news. Messi is BACK! All the pace and energy are there.

But I’m staggered. Wordless. There are times when you don’t know what to say. I only have one page of notes for this match, and the most prominent word is “shit.” I’m not at all sure what that says, but those who believe that in expletives lie an odd sort of elegance will find immense comfort in that delectatious four-letter dung analog.

This match was sitting there for us on a silver platter. All we had to do was tip over a team that was ready and willing to collapse. But as we have done all season, we propped them up and gave them life, and must live with the result.

I saw the starting lineup: Valdes, Puyol, Milito, Abidal, Zambrotta, Yaya, Gudjohnsen, Xavi, Dos Santos, Ezquerro and Eto’o, and didn’t know what to think. But I do know.

“Santi” Ezquerro rolled up with the reindeer and delivered a big, giant, stinking bag of shit. That Rijkaard didn’t pull him off in the first five minutes, once it was clear that he didn’t have what it takes to play in this league, should damn him and put him on the first train (not plane….he’ll need that long, leisurely trip to think about how stupid he was) out of Barcelona.

Phil Schoen said it best when he said that we looked like 11 very talented players, just out there running around. And that’s coaching, kids.

But there’s plenty of blame to go around for this one, because we didn’t play as a team. I don’t care what anyone says about individual brilliance, and who’s missing, and who’s injured and who’s pouting. This draw today came about because Recreativo played their hearts out, and played as a team. We didn’t, which means that we’ll have to pull some rabbits out just to finish second, in the automatic Champions League qualifier. Very few sliding tackles, nobody throwing themselves bodily at balls, nobody playing as if death was preferable to losing, except for El Capitan, Puyol.

Two brilliant goals by Eto’o, but so what? When he wasn’t scoring, he was shit. Everybody was holding the ball too long. Messi can be forgiven for his lapses, as he isn’t match fit, and there’s only so much that practice can do. But we squandered chance after chance after glorious chance. Was their first goal a goal? Nope. But in replay, it was evident. Live and on the field, Valdes and his knee are behind the line, so you probably call that one. And if they didn’t score that one, they would have scored another one, because that’s just how this match was.

Valdes was brilliant, and he was shit. Xavi was just….well….you know. Aside from a couple of grand, lumbering runs, Gudjohnsen was, like almost all of the rest of the fellows sharing the pitch (note the exclusion of the word “teammates”), shit.

Eto’o nailed his goal just over a minute in against a team that has trouble scoring, that is 17th place, battling against relegation. And you knew what would happen, and it did. We lost interest. You can always tell by the lateral and back passes, the leisurely trots about the pitch. And Recretativo played their stalwart little hearts back into this match, and stayed there. Put away that great chance created by Gudjohnsen (and how in the HELL do you cock that one up) and it’s 2-0. The match is completely different, because Recre isn’t Betis. The talent gap is immense. Then Dos Santos gets a great chance, and we manage to mess that one up, too.

We don’t know how to put the knife in. The exiting Ronaldinho is almost certainly happy to be gone. His soon to be ex-mates had the chance to say “You know what? We don’t need him or anyone else. We’re better than that, and here’s the statement.” Instead, they said “We don’t want the championship,” and frustratingly, so did their coach. How in the HELL do you make Dos Santos the first substitution, even if it is for Messi? Ezquerro had us playing 10 against 11 the whole time he was out there, so everybody seemed out of position, and Rijkaard let it happen. He just sat there and watched a match that by all rights, we could just as easily have lost.

In semi-defense of Rijkaard, perhaps Dos Santos was feeling that hard tackle. But he sure didn’t look like it.

That’s enough out of me. I’m sick about this one. And with that, player ratings:

Valdes: 1. Great saves, sure. But if he makes the play instead of stopping inexplicably, no second goal. Bad decisions all match. Is a keeper only as good as his defense? Not entirely. Tell me Buffon or Casillas lets the guy line up that header like that?
Zambrotta: 2. A step slow all match long. When’s that AC Milan deal happening? Not soon enough.
Abidal: 1. He had moments where he wasn’t vile. But the preponderance of evidence points to the word of the day.
Puyol: 4. He tried. Lord knows, he tried. His effort wasn’t enough, and even he was part of the Keystone Kops nonsense that was our back line today. As captain, if you have to grab guys by the shirt and say “Get your damned head in the game,” you do so, and worry about their feelings later.
Milito: 2. Again, a few good plays, but mostly a lot of scrambling around and being caught out of position. Every team that we face for the rest of this season will be telling their fastest player, “Just get the ball and run at that defense, and good things will happen.” There’s a reason Sinama-Pongolle is playing at Recre, and it ain’t because he’s a great attacker. We made him look so today.
Yaya: 4. He tried as hard as Puyol did, and probably got a little frustrated at being tackled (yes, NFL-style) every time he got the ball. But he had an erratic match, when he should have had a great one, to right the ship.
Xavi: 1. Dogshit. Bad passes, a step slow, giveaways. What, is the absense of Iniesta his Kryptonite? He’d been playing really well for a long stretch, so you knew that a game like this one was due. Bad timing.
Gudjohnsen: 2. He wasn’t awful, just mostly invisible except for that opening five minutes or so, when he was actually a reasonable facsimile of a half-ass mid.
Dos Santos: 6. Strong play, with lots of energy and effort. His pace and ball skills were much of the reason for our strong offensive play.
Ezquerro: 0. That’s right. The almighty goose egg. If one person has to take the loss, it’s this guy, for making us play a man down the whole time he was in there. When he was rolling around on the pitch from a typical La Liga foul, somebody should have just shot him. Ugh.
Eto’o: 4. Man, it’s hard to argue with that second goal. He should have been better, but when he starts pressing he becomes a more selfish player, which is never, ever a good thing. He has to learn to pass and move, but he has no confidence in anyone around him except for Ronaldinho and/or Messi, and it shows. Note how he improved when Messi came on.

Substitutes:

Messi: 4. He made a huge difference in our movement and energy. If he puts away one of those chances he had, he gets a higher rating. Had this match left me in a better mood, I might have been able to forgive the rust. Alas, no.
Edmilson: 0. Rumor has it that he came on. I saw no evidence of this.
Victor Vazquez: Incomplete. One offside, nothing outside of that. Looked better than Ezquerro, but so did my elderly grandmother, and she didn’t even play.

This just in:

Okay, as with operas in which everybody dies, you don’t want to leave the audience all cranky and stuff, so here’s some hearts and flowers.

Messi is back. Yay!
When we play one-touch, movement-based football, we are brilliant. When Iniesta and Henry return, look out.
Believe it or not, we are not mathematically eliminated from the championship. Okay, let’s assume that Villarreal and the EE win tomorrow. That will leave us nine points back of first, and three back of second (or something like that….I’m a journalist, not a math whiz.). I’m already counting the three points at the Bernabeu, which means that the EE will have to slip up twice in the six matches that will be left after Sunday. Anybody want to bet on the fact that they won’t? And we have to win out.
I know that some are saying “That team is going to lose to Man U 314-0 at home,” but hang on for a second. We always play up to a challenge. I don’t think that we think enough about weak teams to really play our best, but I believe that you will see our best football against Man U, and we will move through into the Champions League finals. Yay!