Llevant - Barça

Second half was awesome. I had so much fun. And Iniesta showed in the alst two games why he is the European King

Iniesta did great today, but it has been proven time and time again that we and him, suffer when he plays there. One great game will not change that, he has played well before there also.

I still dont like him there, because success there leads people to believe it okay for him to play there. But what people dont understand is, we wont always play Levante, other, stronger teams will not allow us to do what we did so easily.

Anyway, great result and a very fluid second half performance where Iniesta showed fantastic end product. Pedro just doesnt look like scoring at all...at least he showed some good skill otherwise.

Nonesense penalty but justice was served as Valdes pulled out a fantastic second save after reading the initial penalty.

I just hope Pedro's confidence does not go down. I like him this season, and goles will surely come. It is probably a mental thing, as he is kicking ass with Spanish NT.

The Franchise wrote:Iniesta did great today, but it has been proven time and time again that we and him, suffer when he plays there. One great game will not change that, he has played well before there also.

I still dont like him there, because success there leads people to believe it okay for him to play there. But what people dont understand is, we wont always play Levante, other, stronger teams will not allow us to do what we did so easily.

Anyway, great result and a very fluid second half performance where Iniesta showed fantastic end product. Pedro just doesnt look like scoring at all...at least he showed some good skill otherwise.

Nonesense penalty but justice was served as Valdes pulled out a fantastic second save after reading the initial penalty.

Just yesterday more than half of you were partially scared of this match now it's "just Levante"?

The worrying thing for Barcelona will be Dani Alves' injury. It is strengthening my initial thought about his poor performances as a result of him not being physically fit. I believe he has a serious problem that Barcelona staff are hiding, an injury which requires a surgery of some sort. You see quite a few of injuries like this in which the operation gets postponed to the end of the season with the player having to play with pain during the season.

Donuts wrote:

The Franchise wrote:Iniesta did great today, but it has been proven time and time again that we and him, suffer when he plays there. One great game will not change that, he has played well before there also.

I still dont like him there, because success there leads people to believe it okay for him to play there. But what people dont understand is, we wont always play Levante, other, stronger teams will not allow us to do what we did so easily.

Anyway, great result and a very fluid second half performance where Iniesta showed fantastic end product. Pedro just doesnt look like scoring at all...at least he showed some good skill otherwise.

Nonesense penalty but justice was served as Valdes pulled out a fantastic second save after reading the initial penalty.

Just yesterday more than half of you were partially scared of this match now it's "just Levante"?

Number 1, I was not one of them.

Number 2, with all due respect to Levante, they still arent a great team. When I talk about other, stronger teams, you cant figure out who I am talking about?

danyjr wrote:The worrying thing for Barcelona will be Dani Alves' injury. It is strengthening my initial thought about his poor performances as a result of him not being physically fit. I believe he has a serious problem that Barcelona staff are hiding, an injury which requires a surgery of some sort. You see quite a few of injuries like this in which the operation gets postponed to the end of the season with the player having to play with pain during the season.

Indeed and we did the same thing during Yaya Toures first season. I dont think its that severe, but who knows really. Just like last time he came off the pitch, there was hardly any contact.

danyjr wrote:The worrying thing for Barcelona will be Dani Alves' injury. It is strengthening my initial thought about his poor performances as a result of him not being physically fit. I believe he has a serious problem that Barcelona staff are hiding, an injury which requires a surgery of some sort. You see quite a few of injuries like this in which the operation gets postponed to the end of the season with the player having to play with pain during the season.

Maybe we have a plan to sell him in the near future and don't want his price to go down??

I love it how I slated Iniesta and he turns up and gives that performance lol

It's like he heard what I said. Great match.

yea we were talking about u while watching the game lol. Got standing ovation from the levante fans.

RealGunner wrote:yea we were talking about u while watching the game lol. Got standing ovation from the levante fans.

To be fair though, Iniesta could have the worst game in his life and majority of spanish fans will applaud him just for his world cup goal, even some Madrid fans will applaud him.

Anyways, I was really happy and content today to see our defensive line do much better and hold tighter.
one of the most underrated skill is clearing the ball which we seemed to have lacked and costed us many goals this season but we've as of recent been improving alot in that department.

4th injury in the leg biceps for Alves this season. So many muscle injuries usually point out to inadequate rest and diet (party + alcohol). He should focus and take care of his body, he is no longer a kid.

Fortunately, it's only an elongation, barely an injury.

I watched the game but couldn't really follow it cause I was paying more attention to the elections. Seems iniesta had a great game and Messi scored two more goals, and the highlights showed a great game from Valdes. Nice.

Iniesta on the wings still is not that great regardless of the result.

That being said, Iniesta was out of this world today, amazing stuff

This is a fantastic result.

Tw Lineker: "2 more goals for Messi. 82 this year. I hope when he beats Muller's all-time record he is not wearing the rocket ice-lolly kit"

I think i posted messi would score twice but not sure.

I was correct!

ColoJunior wrote:Levante to get crushed 4-0





















Or win 2-1 <3

Honestly i was confident in Iniesta in performing....

As i said in the chat before the game as long as Alba is behind him it's ok.

Of course any football fan, Barca or otherwise will want to see Iniesta in the middle because that's where he's at his best.

But as long as there's a LB behind him like Alba who can provide width and stretch the play most of the issues with Iniesta playing on the left quite frankly disappears.

The reason it was so poor in the past is because Abidal was at LB and as great as he is he's no force going forward.

Keita would usually be used in midfield in the past and you all may not like Cesc but he's a lot better than Keita lol...

So Iniesta on the left meant.... no width and a major reliance on Xavi for everything creativity wise.

Now with Alba you have width and with Cesc or Thiago you have players who can open teams up in the middle so i feel most of the issues with it are no longer there.

Obviously it would be much better with Villa, Tello or Sanchez on the left ( who i feel is good on the left but trash on the right) and Iniesta in the middle but i don't feel the issues with Iniesta on the left are really as bad as they once was.

Iniesta had one great game as LW. Fantastic. However, he played as LW vs. Madrid too or Spartak with Alba behind and was far from impressive. We can't draw conclusions from one game.

In Madrid game, Iniesta was specially uneffective and when a real forward came in we were much better.

Some time back I had complained that we were not playing as per our style and there was too much of hard running in our play with the usual symphony lacking. Some of you had told me it was too early to draw firm conclusions.

Now I must say that during the last few weeks I have been very pleased with our team. We are playing as per our style and its wonderful. Some of the unsuccessful variations that the bit too innovative Pep tried in his last season have been discarded by the more practical Tito. The one big concern of course is the defense. Puyol and Pique don't seem like they will play every game or for that matter be fit for every big game and that is where the worries largely lie. Other than that we look like being sort of back to the arguably all time best team status that we have been given by so many of the who's who of the football world.

free_cat wrote:Iniesta had one great game as LW. Fantastic. However, he played as LW vs. Madrid too or Spartak with Alba behind and was far from impressive. We can't draw conclusions from one game.

In Madrid game, Iniesta was specially uneffective and when a real forward came in we were much better.

I have to agree. Its one thing doing what he did vs Levante, but Madrid and other strong teams....no.

My problem isnt that we played him in this position vs Levante, as shown it isnt automatic fail. I dont like it, but I admit it is possible to pull off.

However, when he plays there people get the idea he can play there in all games. That I dont like.

I also think its relevant that since Pique has come back, we have looked better at the back. I dont think this is luck.

I agree. The return of our CB instilled more confidence to our game and as consequence the team has become more lethal upfront.

Piqué is in a surprising good form. It is worth acknowledging how fast he reacted when a Barcelona player passed to martins and he was able to catch him and pressure him enough to force the mistake.

First off, I really dislike Iniesta at LW...Yes, he was magical, there's no getting around how phenomenal he looked...in the 2nd half...That 1st half, however, he, along with the team, were largely ineffective in that final third - which is normally how he operates on that wing despite playing very well in that 1st half

Iniesta is odd in his play because his baseline in most matches is fantastic but every now & then he puts in a virtuoso performance...It just so happened that he was on that left wing but we've all seen him out there plenty of times where he was a lot like that 1st half....I think sometimes we get spoiled by players like Leo & Xavi whose baseline is a notch above...I kept thinking Iniesta's game would transform into a more dominating player more consistently but his Illusionista form is in spurts, for me

When he's on, like he was in that 2nd half, it's fantastic to watch...I caught the Canal+ telecast and they were giddy over Iniesta too...Pure joy

free_cat wrote:Piqué is in a surprising good form. It is worth acknowledging how fast he reacted when a Barcelona player passed to martins and he was able to catch him and pressure him enough to force the mistake.

Very true, shades of 09 on that one. Reacted very well, didnt think he would be able to effect the play when someone as quick as Martins had that space.