by Victor Meldrew »
25 Apr 2012 16:33
Mr Angry Anybody else surprised at Barcelona's tactics of basically pass pass pass for the whole night without ever thinking of shooting, and they only went wide to Alves in order for him to er..... pass it back from where it came from; pretty well every English team facing the situation that Barcelona had last night (both opposing central defenders off the pitch) would have had it wide for whipped in crosses to be attacked by someone like Puyol all night long....
All (admittedly, a massive all) Chelsea had to do was keep their shape, keep their discipline, and try to keep their concentration.
Not surprised at all at the way they played-that is what they do and about 95 times out of 100 it works.
Going back to the game at Stamford Bridge 3 years ago when Barcelona had 10 men and Chelsea were leading 1-0 (after another park the bus game in Spain) Barcelona kept passing and attacking in the same way and eventually with about 2 minutes left Iniesta scored.
There is no point doing a Chelsea or what most English clubs do in that position and welly the ball forward in the vague hope that somebody can get a fluky goal.
Last night it didn't work for Barcelona but let's not forget they hit the woodwork twice and scored two goals so in an attackingg sense they did o.k. but they conceded the Ramires goal because they didn't have a left-back.
Most times it works for them (I think the stat is that they have won 13 of the last 16 competitions they have been involved in) and they win,last night they only drew the game playing that way so presumably they really don't have to think too much about having a plan B.
Having seen nearly all of Barcelona's games on TV for the past 10 years and twice in the flesh I was surprised that they didn't line up with Adriano at left-back,Messi through the middle and Sanchez wide right-presumably he went with 3 at the back because he felt that an extra defender was unnecessary knowing Chelsea's negative tactics however Adriano/Iniesta attacking from the left and Alves/Sanchez down the right and no Cuenca would IMHO have been a better shape.
The other thing I think is that Fabregas (after missing those 2 sitters last week) was over eager to do well and impress playing against an English side and he didn't.
I also think that Messi is carrying the groin injury that he suffered when over-stretching at Stamford Bridge as he didn't show any of his electric pace and only rarely took players on.
