Re: Match Day Thread

[FennecFox7]

Alex raises some really good points. the pace of the game has changed big time. Even Ronaldo, out of all people, presses and tracks back. Shaqiri is having to run his socks off at liverpool.

The athletic component of football is finally catching up to the times.. and one player, no matter how good they play, is almost useless in a way if they don't run, make runs, show for the ball, hold their position. Players are just physically at another level and they will punish you for it.

There's a reason 10's don't exist anymore. James, Isco, Fabregas, damn even Benz to an extent have had to adapt their game in one way or another. that position doesn't exist anymore.. as i've previously mentioned, athletes are at another level nowadays with conditioning and power

All ronaldo fans are alexjanosik fans no surprise here, he is the one who is insulting messi the most, must be orgasm for ronaldo fans to read his posts in daily basis

I've always praised messi and given him props when due. I've also said he is the GOAT. his problem here is not an ability problem clearly. it's more of a mentality problem and it's to be expected when you win everything and anything

you and harmonica on the other hand can't even bring yourselves to praise anyone but messi. bring something to the discussion or honestly shut up

[Kebab]

I praise many players. for me Neymar is second best player in the world. And Coutinho 3rd best player. and fourth is your idol

Haterjanosik's points are biased because he never mentioned that team should have been exhausted from pressing so hard in previous 4 games. its a simple point, very simple, but he never mentions it. This is just an example, his all comments looks like that way. Yesterday he surpassed Harmonica for mentioning Messi's name in his comments. 728 times - world record for mentioning someone's name in online forums. His only intention is to show the world that "see i was right about Messi".  This is a normal human behavior to counter attack if he receives many criticism for doing something

[Kebab]

1 player especially the best player cant make so much difference in loss, its impossible. You win all matches but when he comes back you lose. It cant be so simple. there are big problems in the team. In last 4 matches they won thanks to extra pressing and hard work, if you watched matches live you could see that everything in attack was below average. Misplaced final passes, wasted chances, lost balls. They won those balls back because of hard work but its not a great way to play football

Also R.Madrid and Inter allowed team to play. There was only 1 difficult match (parked bus) and it was Rayo game. Barca team never had problems against teams which allowed them to play, they always had problems against parked buses and in messi's absence it only occurred once and in that game we all saw how terrible Valverde's game plan was, even hard pressing didnt help
And then suddenly alexjanosik appears like some of ronaldo fans on youtube and puts every blame on messi. So simple and easy

[windkick]

Valverde is such a pussy.

Opting to play boring, defensive mentality 4-4-2 against a team that’s struggling to score and is known for having a tough defensive record af home. 40 mins in and we are struggling to create anything with Arthur and Sergi as the left/right mid players who have zero speed and offer zero width.

[windkick]

Wow he doesn’t bring on Dembele to add speed until the 80th min, when he is forced to because we gave up a goal.

[danyjr]

As I said on the General section I've covered more distance behind my TV than Messi has all match.

[windkick]

Oh jesus, lol

Your going to blame the 442 with 150M Dembele/Malcom speedsters on the bench until the 80th min on the guy with the assist Messi? Dude you got issues. This games dullness and lack of attack was on EV. If you think its all because of Messi your insanely delusional

[BarrileteCosmico]

Are the 2 mutually exclusive? I don't think anyone can argue that Messi bathed himself in glory today. He looked lethargic and disinterested, and failed to impact the game as we all know he can. That doesn't mean Valverde didn't make a mistake in the line up or game plan.

[danyjr]

Oh jesus, lol

Your going to blame the 442 with 150M Dembele/Malcom speedsters on the bench until the 80th min on the guy with the assist Messi? Dude you got issues. This games dullness and lack of attack was on EV. If you think its all because of Messi your insanely delusional

I've questioned that beta coach Valverde plenty of times, including on this thread alone, I thought it wasn't necessary to blame him for his lack of balls again

[windkick]

Hey I’m not ignoring Messi could do more nor am I saying he’s a perfect player. Messi can be the most brilliant and frustrating player at any given time.

That said, I don’t blame Sergi’s, Vidal’s, Rafinha’s, and Arthur’s bad games on him. That flat line of 4 that Valverde set up with zero fast, creativing width players against a team like Atletico that has struggled to score all season but defends to the end is just ridiculous and cowardly. That’s on Valverde not Messi; again not saying Messi was flawless pressing but he was doing some great dribbling in tight spaces and trying to find players to pick out with his passes when he got the ball and low and behold, no one was found because the player able to over lap was Alba who was having a hafd time getting open because of Atlético. Also are we going to ignore how bad Suarez was all game? Basically Valverde wanted the flat 4 to hold the ball and defend well and hoped Messi and Suarez did the damage up ront by themselves (basically the same plan Uruguay uses with Cavani and Suarez as the lone guys up front). But Suarez’s touch was horrible all game. And it didn’t help that we had 4 immobile slow midfielders. Made it so easy for Atletico to contain us. Notice the huge difference when Dembele and Malcom came on. Their speed and willingness and ability to take on defenders, that ability to be able to out run and get open to get in scoring positions instantly made everyone look better out there, including Messi who got the assist. So why wait until the 80th min?!

I blame all this on Valverde. He has continued to make these mistakes dating back to the Roma game and he has shown zero signs of improving the team and if anything our defense and record has drastically worsen since then. He cares more about not losing at this point rather than coming out to dominate and win, and when a manager hits that mode you got to move him out. I agree our team isn’t the best it’s been personal wise but we are also not bad. We should be playing better than this. Madrid is having it’s worse run in a decade and we are only 5 points ahead. So yeah, why waste our time with him further, I support sacking him now, getting someone in the intermn and getting a new manager in the summer.

Complaint about Messi all you want but he isn’t going anywhere and replacing him wouldn’t solve our issues if the manager willl continue to have us play like this. It’s like saying if you remove Alexis that Utd would play better and start dominating. They wouldn’t because we all know Mourinho is the one that has to go first. A new injection of life is what’s needed.

[futbol]

If we started with Malcom and Dembélé we would be 0-3 down at half time. Just because we threw the kitchen sink at them with fresh legs against tired legs in the last 10 minutes doesn't mean we would have won had we started like that. Do you think we should have started with Arthur and Busquets in the middle and Malcom and Dembélé on the sides or what? lol

The lineup was pretty logical. Could have started with Dembélé instead of Roberto/Vidal, okay, but then we are 4-3-3 with an empty right side so 4-4-2 was the only option.

Sacking a coach who is first in every competition this season and won the domestic double last season, okay. Will take a while to get Barca fans back down to earth I reckon.

[windkick]

I don’t think we should of started with both, but one of them. Also the 4-3-3 worked wonders against Inter and Madrid yet we play right into Atleticos hands with a 4-4-2

[futbol]

4-3-3 without Messi is a different animal, my friend. 4-3-3 with Messi means he should vacate the right side of the pitch but he doesn't. Not offensively, not defensively. It's clear since Luis Enrique that we can't play 4-3-3 with Messi anymore without our right side getting manhandled.

[windkick]

Right, If not a 4-3-3 we could even still play a 4-4-2 but not as defensive as EV plays. Since the Roma game he’s got paranoid about losing as oppose to winning and look at our record since. It’s horrible and it’s pretty ridiculous to blame that all on Messi because he doesn’t track back. Especially considering if not for his offensive efforts we surely would be in the same situation Madrid are in.

A good coach can inspire, and someone like Messi needs someone like that and EV clearly doesn’t do that. He doesn’t inspire anyone on the team, the dudes a lifeless suite standing on the sidelines

[windkick]

Fyi Sergi is out 3-4 weeks and Rafinha tore his ACL and is out for the season. Sucks for him

Wague has been getting rave reviews with the B team, surely he will get some minutes. Same with Aleña

[Kebab]

As i said Coutinho is third best player in the world right now. Without him left flang is average. Alba or this young Arthur is not in his level. Unlike this young Arthur after escaping from crowd he doesnt make a short pass to nearby player. He continues attack and tries to create a goalscoring chance. And Alba has no creativity

Dembele is a fast player who is always needed in this turtle team. He draws attention because he is fast and can dribble. This opens space for Messi and Suarez. Players who dribble well are great tools at opening spaces

[FennecFox7]

There is a huge hate boner for dembele. At the end of the day he is just a kid, and people are wayyy too hard on his attitude (there was an article about his video game addiction.. really) but despite the odds he is definitely making a massive difference.

[windkick]

It’s not just that. He has been showing up to important matches late to training, late to return at half time, and when Messi broke his arm he took 10 mins to warm up to come on leaving us a man down for a good while against Sevilla. And it’s been getting worse with how late he is, he also apparently is eating like shit and staying up all night and hardly sleeping. Basically Suarez and Rakitic made comments because they want him to succeed with the club and be a professional. Mind you Deschamps has repeatedly said the same things about Dembele so it’s not new not is it only coming from the Barca camp regarding his attitude but also from the NT.

[alexjanosik]

He is a young kid. Not all players are professional at that age. The kid has an X factor about him. He has been destroyed by the press and a section of the fans, frozen out by Valverde. Most players would crumble and yet every single time, he has produced the goods from the bench. Tells me he has that X factor. It's up to the team, the coach and the fans to support him and mold him into a bonafide first team player. The question is where does he play. We cant play 4-3-3. Assuming we play 4-4-2 with Messi and Suarez up top, that leaves the 2 wide positions. He can play LM as that one is more secure but then where does that leave Coutinho?

[alexjanosik]

Fyi Sergi is out 3-4 weeks and Rafinha tore his ACL and is out for the season. Sucks for him

Wague has been getting rave reviews with the B team, surely he will get some minutes. Same with Aleña

Glad Scruberto is out. I would play Semedo who is at the very least a good defender with Wague as the backup. Bad for Rafinha but again a player who is clearly not good enough. Time to give Alena a chance. I see this as a blessing in disguise.

[danyjr]

This team won't win shit. With or without Messi.

[Harmonica]

0-0 HT Rakitic again with individual giveaway, I'm starting to think he's sabotaging Barca deliberately. Nobody changes like that in such a short time. All PSV chances came from individual giveaways, Busi had one, Stegen twice. Nothing to do with tactics.

[danyjr]

Time wasting against PSV

What a time to be alive

[Harmonica]

Probably the worst game from Stegen I've seen. Busi and Raki both unacceptably bad.

In good news, a group win.

[Myesyats]

Valverde is horrible. The team has no structure.

Ernesto is like a monkey with a gun. Sometimes he manages to fire a bullet but for the most part he has absolutely no idea what he is doing.

[futbol]

This team won't win shit. With or without Messi.

We're winning trebles and doubles almost every season, what are you on about?

[Sponsored content]