Re: Match Day Thread 19/20

by Myesyats Fri Oct 25, 2019 11:21 pm

Everyone knows how to stop it? Pep's City is doing great, play attractive football and still wins trophies. unlucky in CL but thats another issue

City's games are 10x more watchable than Valverdeball.

We just need more athletic players (aka the opposite of Busquets) and a man like Pep to instruct them. It's that simple

Because right now if I miss game, I feel like i didnt really miss anything. Because we play like garbage

by Harmonica Sat Oct 26, 2019 5:38 pm

My all seeing eye noticed something alarming the last game, Suarez was purposefully walking on the pitch. I wonder if his wife has started talking? He isn't Messi who knows when to walk, and when to strike, nor does he has the same ability, no one has. So if he does that one more time, it's the end of the road for him in Barca I think.

by Myesyats Tue Oct 29, 2019 9:46 pm

The shape is so terrible. This is not a team. This is a colorless blend of individuals. Sad

by alexjanosik Wed Oct 30, 2019 12:51 am

Some good football. Happy with the performance of a few players. FDJ is a bonafide star. A steal at $75m.

by alexjanosik Wed Oct 30, 2019 1:00 am

What was the point of buying Griezman? Waste of 120m. Should have saved the money and stuck another season with Suarez.

by Myesyats Wed Oct 30, 2019 12:59 pm

alexjanosik wrote:Some good football. Happy with the performance of a few players. FDJ is a bonafide star. A steal at $75m.

Agree Frenkie is a legend in the making. Expect him to be the leader of our midfield for the next 10 years.

But Valladolid are relegation bound, let's have some standards for rating the team's performances.

by BarrileteCosmico Sat Nov 02, 2019 4:36 pm

I've said for years now that watching Valverde's Barca is like watching Argentina. Case in point the 3-2 goal (which just got VAR'd out) comes from Messi just taking the ball at the 60 meter line and figuring out a way to score with it, with very little team input other than Griezman returning a 1-2. This works sometimes against small teams (not today, it seems) but almost never when it truly matters.

by danyjr Sat Nov 02, 2019 4:41 pm

True dat.

At least in Argentina's defence we don't have a fantastic squad whereas Barça dish out millions every year to "improve" the squad by signing numpties like Dembélé, Griezmann and Coutinho.

by futbol Sat Nov 02, 2019 6:32 pm

If Rakitic had played. Boy oh boy. Laughing

Arthur-De Jong getting dominated by Slavia Prague and Levante. hmm

by Myesyats Sat Nov 02, 2019 11:09 pm

None of the players is at fault here as individuals, you cant say Levante dominated us because Rochina and Morales are a step above our players ffs. This is a tactics, motivation and discipline issue first. Valverde considered Levante as easy 3 points and allowed the players to relax and thats what happens, I imagine at HT he went into the dressing room and told everyone to take it easy, just keep possession and goals will come. Horrible manager but the players are muppets too because instead of standing up for themselves they keep getting embarrased every game getting dominated by some pleb teams, instead they pretend everything is fine and enjoy their comfortable life. Only De Jong comes out after the games to say we play like shit and don't connect on the pitch at all but soon enough he'll also learn the Barca way of today and accept that this garbage will be on repeat every weekend

by alexjanosik Sun Nov 03, 2019 3:25 am

I watched the first half where we were marginally better. Mats didnt have a save to make while we created chances through Semedo. I am liking him quite a bit at LB. Makes good runs and links well as he has a forward to play off. Had to leave and didnt watch the second half. Learnt later that we had conceded 3.

Problems are structural and player driven. Very little to do with Valverde. BC raises the point that watching us is like watching Argentina. No prizes for guessing the common denominator.

The fundamental issue is that we dont play the modern game and play stone age football. In fact, we are the only team in pro football that plays stone age football. And I include all the lower divisions in all the leagues as well. Watch any team in any league in the world. What is the one common theme you will find? They all defend and attack as a team. All 11 players. You will find just one exception to this.

Do we enjoy a talent advantage compared to other teams? Undoubtedly, and thats the reason we manage to scrape through results in the league. But, the games are extremely competitive and games where we dominate are the exception rather than the norm. We tend to be lucky to win games and win based on individual magic. But as this season shows, that has finally run its course and has its limits too. No matter the huge talent advantage. Because, a modern team with 11 players attacking and defending will easily trump the talent advantage we have. Becomes even more evident at the CL level.

And the stone age football is not the coach's fault. Its a player issue. Watch the way Pep plays or a Klopp plays. Now imagine them coaching Messi's Barca. I guarantee that the result would be the same as Valverde's Barcelona. The automatisms that they employ are not possible with a Messi Barcelona. Gegen pressing wont work here. Fullbacks who look like geniuses under Klopp's Liverpool will look like scrubs under Klopp's Barcelona. And Pep's awe inspiring football at City will become boring and one dimensional if he were to coach us.

by danyjr Sun Nov 03, 2019 9:05 am

alexjanosik wrote:BC raises the point that watching us is like watching Argentina. No prizes for guessing the common denominator.

Are you kidding? Laughing

How many Argentina matches have you watched? Without Messi we wouldn't even make it to the World Cup.

Don't compare the talent in Barcelona to that of Argentina. I agree with the rest of your post though.

by Myesyats Sun Nov 03, 2019 10:59 am

So Slavia Praga and Levante have the players to play the modern game? We get dominated by every bottom of the table team and the coach is not at fault here?

by futbol Sun Nov 03, 2019 11:37 am

Why would the coach be at fault? Previous 2 seasons we bottled away from home in late CL knockouts but we didn't find it difficult to beat Levante or Slavia Prague type of teams or even Inter at home.

Looks like Arthur-De Jong midfield isn't anywhere near as good as Barca fans hoped for. I'm not even blaming them, they are like 5 years away from their primes, can't expect 22 year olds to dominate. Even if they reach their primes they might never dominate to the extend we were used to with Xavi and Iniesta, in fact that's a guarantee. Add to that Griezmann who is useless, Messi yet another year older, Suarez another year older and motivation levels at rock bottom and this is what we get.

I feel like Messi will quit either at the end of this or at the end of next season latest. I think he hates Démbéle and Griezmann and has no joy playing with either. He wanted Neymar, Suarez is the only player he enjoys playing with right now.

I'm not even mad. From Ronaldinho era until 2015 has been an incredible decade. Was never going to be the norm. Low 80 points seasons and CL quarter final exits was the norm and we're back to that.

by alexjanosik Sun Nov 03, 2019 4:45 pm

futbol wrote:Why would the coach be at fault? Previous 2 seasons we bottled away from home in late CL knockouts but we didn't find it difficult to beat Levante or Slavia Prague type of teams or even Inter at home.

Looks like Arthur-De Jong midfield isn't anywhere near as good as Barca fans hoped for. I'm not even blaming them, they are like 5 years away from their primes, can't expect 22 year olds to dominate. Even if they reach their primes they might never dominate to the extend we were used to with Xavi and Iniesta, in fact that's a guarantee. Add to that Griezmann who is useless, Messi yet another year older, Suarez another year older and motivation levels at rock bottom and this is what we get.

I feel like Messi will quit either at the end of this or at the end of next season latest. I think he hates Démbéle and Griezmann and has no joy playing with either. He wanted Neymar, Suarez is the only player he enjoys playing with right now.

I'm not even mad. From Ronaldinho era until 2015 has been an incredible decade. Was never going to be the norm. Low 80 points seasons and CL quarter final exits was the norm and we're back to that.

They are the two best young midfielders on the planet. I would not trade anyone for them. But the set up is wrong to take advantage of their strengths. You need movement and you need dynamism from forwards to play dominant attractive football. Otherwise, what you get is what you play. No matter the players. Lets take De Bruyne. Do you think he would be a tenth as good playing with Messi. He is a one trick pony who relies heavily on Pep's automatisms. The fullback or the winger comes inside, De Bruyne moves between the CM and LB (or vice versa movement) , whip balls into box for on rushing forwards. Now imagine that with Messi. Not gonna happen.

Its a player issue with us. Our forwards exceptt Suarez dont move off the ball when in possession and dont press without it. And we wonder why we cant dominate. And you think thats going to change by getting non-existent upgrades on Arthur and FDJ.

by windkick Mon Nov 04, 2019 3:25 pm

I think you can have world class players or players that are simply "solid", but with a great tactical setup, understanding of position and how to defend via press and how to quickly as a group work as forward for attacking purpose you can get great results.

Plain and simply, yes some players are playing bad, but after this many games in which we get beat/dominated all season by inferior teams on paper, the amount of goals we have leaked in, you have to sit back and look at the manger and question what he is doing to fix the issues. If anything the team has gradually got worse since last season, even though we have more attacking, midfield and defensive options.

Fart really dropped the ball in trusting EV for another season after the two massive clusterfucks from the previous 2 seasons. So I won't sit here and point fingers at players while they get randomly rotated and the results stay the same in terms of performance. The problem is clearly with how we are settup and how we are instructed and that's EV.

by Myesyats Mon Nov 04, 2019 4:26 pm

Its not that these players can't defend or attack as a team. With proper teaching even a dog will learn. At least 80% of the blame lies on the coach that is for certain.

by BarcaLearning Mon Nov 04, 2019 7:20 pm

Yea a lot of the same old Im reading, as everyone keeps repeating for so long now Razz

Its very much EV at fault, although at the same time hes not all that bad, hes a good manager I think, but just not good enough for us, and its gonna be another season of disappointment unless we get a lot of luck, Messi on fire and the team generally improves their play somehow during this season. Otherwise its finally gonna be time for EV and we'll see what happens with the next manager to change the way we are playing.

The other thing is simply we have aging players now its showing also with Pique I think, who has been on and off for a few seasons now, but this last game I finally saw it, hes time is coming soonish I think. With Umtiti injured so often, it appears we would need to look for another CB. Lenglet is solid, but I think we would need another top notch one to replace Pique.

by windkick Sat Nov 23, 2019 2:06 pm

Holy shit have we been bad all season

by BarcaLearning Mon Nov 25, 2019 12:01 pm

Another depressing game. Getting outplayed by yet another low side for long periods is a regular thing now. Its lucky we still have some positives, like De Jong is a monster of a midfielder, so glad we got him. Dembele seems harder working and at least trying harder to improve. Umtiti is doing better and actually playing regularly, etc.

Alba and Roberto and Semedo are all injured or something I take it since it was strange to see both the flanks played by the backups which I just choose to call them that. I guess decent, but we need better Razz

by Myesyats Mon Nov 25, 2019 3:11 pm

Griezmann needs to really step up. He's been abysmal.

El clasico is less than a month away and we still don't look good. I hope we lose actually, Valverde out and new coach from January onwards to save the season.

Messi fuck off to River Plate in the summer please. Pique focus 100% on tennis and then we can have a fresh start.

by BarrileteCosmico Wed Nov 27, 2019 10:50 pm

While I haven't watched Barca particularly actively this season, I thought today was some of the best pressing I've seen recently. And it yielded results. It's clear that when they bother to do it they still know what to do.

by Myesyats Wed Nov 27, 2019 10:56 pm

Of course they know how to do it but Valverde allows complacency especially when we take a 2-0 lead and thats what happens, we had everything under control but last 20 mins they gave away the ball and it couldve been a nervous 3-2.

This team is good, just needs cosmetic changes and also deserves a better coach.

by BarrileteCosmico Wed Nov 27, 2019 11:00 pm

The complacency problem has been plaguing us for years. The worst thing that can happen to us is winning a first leg of a knock out round by 3 goals or more.

by Myesyats Wed Nov 27, 2019 11:10 pm

It hasnt been that much of an issue under Lucho but with Valverde its a common theme to give the initiative away completelty to the opposition after we reach a seemingly comfortable lead which is typical midtable mentality of turdverde.

by danyjr Wed Nov 27, 2019 11:53 pm

I attribute your good performance more to BVB bottling it than Barcelona being particularly great.

You have issues all over the pitch IMHO, starting with LB which I think you desperately need Alba back and a good replacement for him. Firpo is a poor version of Semedo without his athleticism and touch, and is terribly bad at defending. Like wow.

Your midfield despite having De Jong who has been outstanding, is very unathletic. Busquets is pretty much done, Vidal is also not fit to play the Barça style (not sure how Pep played him at Bayern), even though he has his uses he is a squad player not the main man. That leaves you with Arthur and Rakitić. Arthur I've never been a fan of, he hasn't really stepped up his game since joining Barcelona and lacks the vision to find passes that a good midfielder should see. I know some of you don't like Rakitić but I still think he should be starting, he combines very well with Messi and Roberto on the right hand side and is capable of getting inside the box. Not ideal given his age, but he is a better option than Vidal and Arthur.

And your front line is pretty slow, ageing and lacking a classy LW to compliment Suárez and Messi. Dembélé is either injured or playing like shit. Should have offloaded him last year when he was worth something, who would want a KFC eating perma-injured player with a terrible attitude? Griezmann on the other hand is played completely out of position, and although I like Fati he is far too young to start for a team like Barça.

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