Review: Barcelona 4 – 0 Valencia, “Teams win Championships”

By: Isaiah | December 7th, 2008

Holy howitzers, boys and girls. This was the right game for Kevin to go see live. It had four goals and a chant of “Henry! Henry!” rolling through the crowd. Maybe everyone just followed who they thought was Thuram in the chant. Regardless, you were left with the distinct impression — especially if you listened to Ray Hudson — that Henry was well and truly Man of the Match thanks to his hat trick. I will not be so effervescent, so over-the-moon as our boy RayRay. I’m sure Kevin will kick my ass when he comes back, but it’s well worth it.

I watched this match in two halves — like everyone else, of course, but my first half took place live and my second half was watched at 11pm. My parents took my lady and me out to the New York City Ballet to see The Nutcracker. I’d never been to the ballet before; if you’re a ballet fan and you haven’t been to Lincoln Center, I would highly recommend it. If you’re not a ballet fan, we can have a beer while our respective better halves enjoy the show.

So the first half was brilliant. Brighter than the dark side of the flashlight, as Hudson might put it. Absolutely scintillating stuff from our boys, dominate in every part of the field from start to finish. There was ample space to play in their end, while our end was tighter than a steel drum in winter. There was no space for them to move in midfield, no way that Villa was going to beat 3 defenders, plus a box-to-box Yaya.

Our midfield was incredible. I mean, absolutely amazing. I’ve always found it hard to rate midfielders defensively because it’s the little things that matter the most: pressure, forcing opponents to make bad passes. Yaya is easier to rate defensively because he is obviously Fee-Fie-Foe-Fum-ing and making bread out of bones. Xavi and Gudjohnsen are not so easy to rate defensively, but if you take the amount of time the other team had on the ball in the middle third, you’ll realize that they were doing something very well.

The game headed in our direction starting when defensive pressure freed Xavi into the middle, one-on-one and he dinked it off the post. Ray Hudson called him Hleb like 5 times before the replay suggested he was wrong. Not the last time Huddy would be wrong, of course, just a good indication of where his brain was (here’s a hint, look in his cups). I still can’t believe that Xavi missed that chance.

Our first goal was exquisite. Yaya places a ball daintily, with love, on a silver platter and Henry deftly flicks it home. Renan nearly makes a great save, but the ball winds up in the back of the net anyway. Absolutely dazzling pass from Yaya, wonderful touch from Henry, and we were off and running. This was the first instance of the immense amount of space Valencia was giving up in the back thanks to their midfield’s lack of cohesion. Watch the goal here. Note that the ball starts with Valdes, who gives a very short outlet to Marquez, who turns and passes it vertically to Yaya. No one is within 3,000 yards of Yaya, so he just turns and starts to lumber forward. Because Valencia was obviously terrified of our offensive capabilities, their midfielders immediately began to backpedal, leaving Yaya with acres of space and leaving Henry, Messi, and Hleb open up front. Messi, being in the middle, just stands there, and the two central defenders stand there with him. And by the time they realize that Henry is cutting in from the wing, it’s too late because the ball is on its way.

The second goal, 8 minutes later, developed again from our half and rapidly moved forward. Alves slips the ball to Xavi, who slips the ball back. Alves’ pace moves him from midfield to attacking third before Valencia’s midfield recognizes the danger. Their back line actually does a good job, but their midfield is very slow to get back. Check out the goal here [link fixed, thanks ajani]. A great pass from Alves to Hleb on the left wing shifts the point of attack away from the concentrated defenders. Hleb then slides an easy pass to Henry who one-times it in. Beautifully taken goal, great spacing. However, I believe this goal should be blamed on Fernandes, but I’m not sure if I’m right. He’s the right side midfielder who doesn’t make the run to cover Henry. He just watched a bit and then realizes that that’s his man cutting in from the wing for the wide-open shot. If that’s not Fernandes, then whoever it really is is the one responsible for the goal.

The third goal, coming right after halftime, was a little bizarre. Watch it here. Hleb is obviously offside, but the Valencia player also obviously deflects it to Hleb. I actually saw that live and was appalled at Hudson and Schoen’s inability to consider that maybe, just maybe, it had deflected and that’s why the ref called for play on. Now, I don’t really think that it’s right to let play go on like that, but I think technically that’s the right ruling. Yaya intention was not to pass it to Hleb and that the defender sent the ball towards Hleb shouldn’t cause Barcelona to be penalized. The goal, though, was exquisite. Alves makes a darting run forward, Xavi sees him, and slips the ball behind the defense, who had stranded itself by stopping and staring at the ref. Oops.

Here’s where the great error by Hudson and Shoen happens. They call for the ref’s heads, claiming the worst call in history. Then, about 20 minutes later when the replay clearly showing a deflection is shown, they talk about how great the ref’s call was. No, that’s bad form. Apologize for calling for his head and all is forgiven. Instead, you act like you knew it all along cause you’re a couple of jackasses. Well done, boys.

The fourth goal was another brilliant pass, this time from Bojan. Watch the whole thing here. Xavi gives the ball to Alves on the wing with some space, Bojan makes a tight little run, Alves slips him in, Bojan has a neat touch to get past his defender and then with a little look, he freezes the last defender and the pass to Henry is the simplest goal you can score. So great to see the kid getting a hand in a goal, especially after the crap he’s been getting for his performance against Getafe. No one covered Henry’s run, once Bojan was beyond them. Terrible defending, great attacking.

So there you have it, a complete rout. Now for the ratings. Here’s how I judged each player: I took the number of minutes they played, divided by the number of passes they complete, plus the shots on goal, multiplied by percentage of yellow cards earned, adding fouls earned, multiply by 11. No, I’m joking. I started at 5 and worked my way up or down depending on if I thought they were positively contributing or not.

Valdes: 6. He didn’t have to do anything. He just stood there most of the time and collected bad balls over the top and back passes. He made the only defensive move he was called on to make by shutting down Villa and forcing him over the endline.

Alves: 10. Best game he’s had in the shirt, combining so smartly with Messi a couple of times and opening up the defense several times. He could have scored on the freekick that he whistled over the bar and he did score by being alert and slotting home. He could do with less play-acting, though. (And the ref could send off Villa for a second bookable offense)

Marquez: 8. Great game from the Kaiser, who controlled Villa very well.

Puyol: 8. Just like Marquez, Puyol was a rock. Marquez was a little better, I thought, but Puyol was more adventurous going forward.

Abidal: 8. Great game from the winger, shutting down Joaquin completely. I’m so glad to have him back on the wing. It just adds so much depth to our game.

Yaya: 8. Man-sized score for a man-sized player. Only a few mistakes, including one giveaway from doing too much fancy footwork, but also like 80,000billion tackles in midfield. Awesome. Valencia’s YFR: 99%, but only because it’s been 12 hours since they saw him. You have been officially Yaya-ed.

Xavi: 7. Good stuff from the little man in the middle. Good distribution, good harassment, would have an 8, but I do expect him to score those one-on-ones. That’s just the kind of guy I am.

Gudjohnsen: 6. I know that I’m probably being biased here, but Guddy just didn’t seem to do that much. He still looks lost to me and holds the ball for far too long, then back-passes it. But I can’t argue with his defensive moves. Also, I’m confused a bit about what role he’s supposed to be playing. Is he the new Iniesta? If so, he gets a -30. Is he Yaya Jr? Is he Xavi Jr? What the hell are you!? You’re an Icelandic Monument, that’s what you are. And I’m beginning to like you. Whoa.

Hleb: 6. Some good movement, some good passes, and some bad of both, too. I’m still really looking forward to Iniesta’s return so that “Alexander the Great” (Hudson-ism) can ride a bit of pine. He’ll grow into the squad, but because I was never a fan of his signature in the first place, I’ll gladly take the heat for being too harsh on him.

Messi: 2. Yup, you read it right, folks. I know that there’s going to be some backlash for this, but whatever, he didn’t do anything. I watched him specifically for quite a bit of the match and he didn’t make runs, he didn’t attempt to go to the ball (leaving a few of his teammates stranded because of it), and he didn’t fill space (leaving Henry all alone against multiple defenders several times). You could argue that he was distracting the defenders, but that’s not what we pay Messi for and it’s not what we expect out of him. If we ignore expectations, Henry just had another game, rather than a brilliant performance. What’s fair for Henry is fair for Messi. What now, Kevin!?

Henry: 10. His best game in blaugrana coincides with Kevin’s visit. Imagine that. He created space, filled space, took his chances, created more for others, and worked his ass off. When Messi (and Guddy) left him stranded, he used fancy footwork to get out of it and get the ball back to Abidal or Xavi rather than turning the ball over (Messi). Kudos, Monsieur Henry, vous etez le….fromage. Wait, I don’t speak French. Henry rocked the house. Finally. Now he just has to keep it up.

Subs:
Bojan: 8. Perhaps slightly inflated for a guy who played only 15 minutes, but damn did he do a lot. He should have had 2 assists, but the second one wasn’t to be because no one made the right run to meet the ball.

Pedro: 5. This is probably a very unfair rating. Perhaps “incomplete” would have been better, but that’s not how I roll. He was stuck into a Xavi-esque roll and that’s not his style. Bad substitution (on for Messi)…it should have been Busquets.

Keita: 6. Basically forced Pedro into a midfield roll by playing center forward. Cool, but didn’t do much other than help keep the pressure in Valencia’s end. If he’d connected with that header and scored, it would have just been icing.

Guardiola: 7. Pedro didn’t need to go on. Sorry. You get a -1 for that.

Man of the Match: The Team. Team effort = team win. Hell yeah.

Shaktar next, then it’s Real Madrid. Holy balls. Let’s do this!