Saturday at 20:00
Venue: Camp Nou
Channels: Gol TV, Canal + Liga

Watch out this Zaragoza. They are in great form and have placed themselves in the midle of the table. However, they are mostly outscoring their opposition, and playing at outscoring we are the best, so we should manage a win. Plus, his coach Manolo Jimenez, made it very easy for us in his previous visits to Camp Nou with Sevilla.

Possible lineup:

VV
Montoya Piqué Bartra/Mascherano Jordi Alba

Xavi --- Song --- Iniesta

Pedro -- Messi -- Tello

Villa trained in the gym yesterday, so this points out to him staying in the bench. As Alexis is injured, Pedro will play for sure. Possible call up for Deulofeu. Busquets is suspended so Song will start. I don't see Iniesta being benched twice in a row in the league, so I guess Cesc will be benched and Xavi that didn't travel to Panama partner him.

Hope Tito makes Pedro play a bit more as inside forward, although he is having a great season IMO, he could add some goals if Tito let's him go into scoring positions as Guardiola did or Del Bosque has done with such a great result (7 super goals in 3 games).

I dont think Pedro has had a great season, I would say a good comeback season. Going 13 games without a goal is worrying, but he has made plays for others so im happy with that.

I do wonder why he is scoring so often for Spain though. Probably the level of opponants is a factor for them.

But yeah anyway, I like the line up there. Villa played for Spain so I assume he isnt going to start for this one. Another chance for Song and I hope Bartra is in ahead of Mascherano.

Anyone have an estimated date for Thiago and Cuenca's returns? I thought Thiago was supposed to be back by now.

Edit: Messi also trained in the gym free. Thiago still training apart with Adriano. No news on Cuenca. The canteranos that trained with the team were Cristian Tello, Rafinha, Sergi Gómez y Bañuz, so Deulofeu is unlikely.

Carles Puyol was declared fully fit on Friday after injuring his elbow on October 2 in Barça’s 2-0 win away to Benfica-Barça. Forty-five days after suffering an injury that he was expected to take eight weeks to recover from, he is available once again for selection by Tito Vilanova.

The Barça manager has thus recovered one of the most important elements of his defence, with Gerard Piqué also back in the team. But Barça will still be missing all of Alexis, Adriano, Thiago, Muniesa, Cuenca and Abidal, plus the suspended Busquets.

Training session

All of the available players were at today’s session, as were Barça B’s Tello and goalkeeper Bañuz, while Adriano and Thiago worked separately. Víctor Valdés was given the option of a day off after becoming a father this morning, and eventually opted for a lighter session on his own just before his team-mates took to the pitch.

Meanwhile, Villa, Messi and Alves, who stayed in the gym on Thursday, trained normally on the Ciutat Esportiva pitch today.

The team has one more meeting before the Zaragoza match on Saturday night, starting at 11.30 in the Camp Nou.

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Messi, Cesc, Pique, and Valdes now all impregnating their women at the same time. HGH increases fertilty. Anyone got some tin foil hats?

Im hoping for that starting eleven Free put up with Barta and Pique in the starting eleven!
Villa will for sure be rested for UCL game whilst Mascherano needs the extra rest not only for a fresh approach to the CL game but also the constant poor performances he has produced thus far. Having a look on the bench of how Barta and Pique play, he will know that he needs to put in the extra legs to be a constant starter in the team.

Good result. Two most important things for me to take from this match:
- P&P are back.
- Leo. Became a little invisible after his second goal but was great the rest of the game.

Barcelona Section sure has died in the past few days
anyways my opinion our wingers didn't really do anything, Pedro, Villa and Tello all were asleep Alba stepped up in their absence.
Puyol is a lion never wanted to leave the pitch even though we conceded you could tell our defensive line was more confident with Puyol's presence there.
Pique was pretty well today along with Song although he misplaced many weird passes.
Iniesta, Xavi amazing like always and Messi is back as of late he's been meh in his standards (still the best but lower then usual) but he was a goat this match faultless.
Monotya was at fault for the first goal hopefully he practices more with clearing and glad Barta got some minutes in.

The game just finished, most on-game commenting happens at the chat, and we come here for after-the game comments.

I thought Puyol was incredibly rusty. I'm not sure if I trust him ahead of the Spartak clash, especially as Tito doesn't see him fit to play 90 minutes yet. It was still very nice to see Puyol-Pique play though. Since Bartra came in for Puyol... does this mean Masche has been relegated to 4nd choice or merely wanting to develop the young player?

Montoya at fault for the goal, made a stupid mistake.

Song had a very good game, even not taking into account the goal (they were stupid not to mark him in the box). One of the top performers.

Messi with two good goals, getting closer to 85. How many games do we have left for him to reach it?

I really can't say much about this game tbh.

EDIT: Hopefully Bartra coming in is a little taste of ostracization for Mascherano good to see Bartra getting more minutes.

Not a great performance.Marked by sloppy passing,especially from Iniesta and Pique.Iniesta missed a lot of easy passes and turned over the ball a lot.I wish Pique stops thinking that he is Xavi.He takes too long on the ball and runs into cul de sacs.Then he tries a risky ball which he cant pull off and we end up losing possesion.Just pass the ball to Xavi.Simple.
Its a worry that we conceded again,again from a defensive mistake.
Messi was the best player on the pitch and had a great game.The touch to get away from the defender for his first goal was simply genius.
I also want to comment on our pressing game.This game we tried to press hard but were very poor at executing it.Messi pressed hard but to no avail.
Compared to our earlier seasons under Pep we have become poor at pressing.Just goes to show that we cant just turn it on and off.We cant not press for many games and then suddenly try to press aggressively and expect it to be successful.
We treied to press hard but Zaragoza still had plenty of the ball and were able to play the ball out of defense relatively comfortably.
Our pressing looked disjointed and individual rather than an aggressive cohesive unit.

Some of Xavi's movements and dribbling to get away from markers was just

alexjanosik wrote:
We treied to press hard but Zaragoza still had plenty of the ball and were able to play the ball out of defense relatively comfortably.
Our pressing looked disjointed and individual rather than an aggressive cohesive unit.

I believe it's mainly due to Alba / Montoya playing and in this game Villa didn't really help defensively nor did Pedro.
Most of their attacks developed from the wings to be honest.

alexjanosik wrote:Some of Xavi's movements and dribbling to get away from markers was just

Noted this in chat. Xavi's ball control and movement today was-no lie- as good as I've ever seen it

So I finally got around to writing something again:

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1413341-assessing-barcelonas-3-1-liga-performance-over-zaragoza

Check out my thoughts on the game!

Cheers.

I think Bartra coming on made sense because the game was done and bringing Mascherano on at that point would have been pointless - he doesn't need minutes.

Kizz Messi is not playing the Argentina friendly against Brazil. That friendly is only between teams made up of players not playing in Europe, hence people calling it the "seleccion local".

Also Song is not one of your top performers? I thought it was a night where he did everything right, and added a goal to his name. From my perspective, better than Alba.

Bartra is now out for 3 weeks so if it was Masche was ostracized he will no longer be - I think we will see Masche start against Spartak alongside Pique.

Masch imo was always gonna be starting on Wednesday unless he got injuried. He had his rest on the weekend and now he will be fresher for midweek game agaisnt Spartak...
As for the game, one touch football at times was beautiful to watch and Xavi and his movements on the ball were simply He had a great game. Iniesta had some good touches though sometimes missed simple passes...
Villa again wasn't heavily involved in play and therefore got subbed on for Tello to make an impact on the game which he kinda did (needs to shoot more on the left than cutting inside and shooting on his right...).
I thought subbing off Puyol was a great idea from Tito as I was worried espeically with Puyol heavily bandaged that he may get minorily injuried... He wasn't as strong in the defense but his presence on the pitch seemed to boost the team...
Song had a great game. Shut off some plays very well, one touch football was great and good goal!
Messi Thats all I'll say! Can't explain that performance to words... After struggling in a few games, he played a very good performance and deservingly had two goals and an assist...

So can some one confirm the injured players on the team and expected return dates?

- Cuenca: When he is expected back?
- Thiago: When is he expected back?
- Abidal: When is he expected back?
- Adriano: When is he expected back?
- Barta: When is he expected back?
- Alexis: When is he expected back?
- Muniesa - is this guy injured or whats going on with him? Last I remember he was on crushes

Am I missing anyone?

I think i read somewhere that Pui's subbing was a kind of mistake. He complained to Alba about having some minor problems with his leg, and told him notify Tito to warm up someone just in case. Alba understood it wrong and told Tito taht Pui needs to be subbed. That's why he seamed a bit angry when leaving the pitch. He was just confused.

eelir wrote:I think i read somewhere that Pui's subbing was a kind of mistake. He complained to Alba about having some minor problems with his leg, and told him notify Tito to warm up someone just in case. Alba understood it wrong and told Tito taht Pui needs to be subbed. That's why he seamed a bit angry when leaving the pitch. He was just confused.

Yeah this is true. No biggie. Good sub in the end for me.

Cuenca's most recent injury update slated him for a late November or early December return - Tito even commented that there's no rush...He has apparently put on 3 kgs of muscle mass and is doing well...Still, it's far longer than initially projected

Thiago was supposed to be out 8 weeks which would be the end of November

Bartra is out 2-3 weeks which would be end of November, beginning of December

Adriano out 3 weeks which would bring him back by the end of the month

Alexis out a month which would be early to mid December

Muniesa had ACL surgery and is out a minimum of 6 months - Spring is the earliest we'd see him return to training in all likelihood

The press will make this look like Puyol to leave Barca whilst Ray Hudson makes it look like Puyol's dedication to Barca.

FCBarça wrote:Cuenca's most recent injury update slated him for a late November or early December return - Tito even commented that there's no rush...He has apparently put on 3 kgs of muscle mass and is doing well...Still, it's far longer than initially projected

Thiago was supposed to be out 8 weeks which would be the end of November

Bartra is out 2-3 weeks which would be end of November, beginning of December

Adriano out 3 weeks which would bring him back by the end of the month

Alexis out a month which would be early to mid December

Muniesa had ACL surgery and is out a minimum of 6 months - Spring is the earliest we'd see him return to training in all likelihood

Thanks!

windkick wrote:Thanks!

Cheers

BTW, Adriano & Thiago returned to team training today