Football Orphan: Barça boat left stranded in the broken sea.
Photo courtesy of uk.eurosport.yahoo.com
With a weekend packed to the rafters full of action and talking points, it was quite the conundrum to decide where to focus the main attention today. Alex Ferguson suffered his worst ever defeat as a player or a manager when Manchester City knocked Manchester United for six at Old Trafford on Sunday. Queens Park Rangers got the better of their old rivals Chelsea at Loftus Road. Andre Villas Boas will begin his own inquest as to how seven of his player received yellow cards while two others saw red. Ac Milan came from three goals down to beat Lecce with former Tottenham and Portsmouth player Kevin Prince Boateng grabbing a hat trickin Serie A. Real Madrid traveled to La Rosaleda to face Andalucia’s richest club Malaga hammering them four nil, as Cristiano Ronaldo hit a fifteen minute hat trick of his own. This was then bettered by Levante’s three nill away win against Villarreal at El Madrigal to put them unpredictably top of La Liga.
For me personally, the story of the weekend was in the game of the weekend in La Liga, where not a single goal was to be found. Another Andalucian team Sevilla, travelled to Camp Nou to take on arguably the world’s greatest football team, Barcelona. As per usual Barça were attempting to suffocate the opposition passing Sevilla to the brink of frustration. Accumulating more than seventy percent of the play, Barça went close yet again to breaking the deadlock as Andres Iniesta hit the bar mid way through the second half. The story of the evening was Sevilla’s twenty nine year old goalkeeper Javi Varas, a man who was playing amateur football up the age of twenty-three, keeping La Blaugrana at bay almost single-handedly. He made save after save and looked as though his goal was impenetrable. As the game wore on it became the Barça versus Javi Varas show, as the Sevilliano produced a man of the match performance and will take some displacing by Sevilla’s regular goalkeeper Anders Palop, who is currently out injured.
The last meaningful passage of play saw Andres Iniesta win a penalty for Barcelona. The spot kick was delayed after some gamesmanship by Fredric Kanoute as he tapped the ball off the penalty spot before leaving the 18 yard area. Only moments later having received a yellow card for his misdemeanour, Kanoute was involved in a scuffle with Cesc Fabregas which resulted in the Mali striker being sent off. When we eventually got around to the small matter of Lionel Messi‘s penalty, the man of the moment Javi Varas dived confidently to his left to deflect Messi’s unconvincing strike away. The size of the task was tremendous before hand for Sevilla, no team had taken a point from the Camp Nou this season. Sevilla had not only stopped Barcelona in their tracks, but they eventually got under their skin. Perhaps this could be the catalyst for Sevilla to really kick-start their season. By their own standards the last couple of seasons have been a little less than satisfactory.
Football Orphan: Invincible Barca collect yet another prize.
Football is delicious when all the components are correctly in place. I personally could purr over a fine defensive display, or a spectacular passing master class. I enjoy a good tough, but fair contest of survival of the fittest too between two sides who fight to be recognized in their pursuit of a higher platform on which to play.
Football has a disgusting habit of imploding on itself and depriving us of what we all anticipate to be the ultimate, and the pinnacle of our game. Every time the cynic in me raises its ugly head, an optimistic Barca play their usual gushing passing game and produce a trophy winning performance to redeem what is beautiful in our game.
Friday nights performance in Stade Louis II in Monaco was only somewhere between second and third gear for the Catalans, and yet we will see both goals in Barca’s Super Cup winning performance on the highlight reel for some time to come. Goals from Lionel Messi and Cesc Fabregas that could only be described as breathtaking, secured Pep Guardiola‘s place in FC Barcelona folklore. Guardiola became the most decorated coach ever for Barca, and in record time too, winning twelve trophies in four years in charge.
I believe we will eventually become complacent with what we expect from Pep’s well-groomed Barcelona team. Although already two trophies to the better at just the beginning of the season, what more can we really expect of this modern-day football miracle?
How long will they continue to make us gasp in delight at their delicious brand of football? How many more trophies can they win? The bigger question begs to be asked though. At what point will fickle football fans start to become intolerant with the same club winning all of the silverware? Even with La Masia, classed as the finest, and most successful youth system in the world, surely this kind of success couldn’t go on forever?
The Catalan giants now “soil” their shirts with a sponsor to assist paying for what has been described by Spanish media as barely manageable debts. But this in fact appears to be a move towards a more mature financial outlook for the future. Madrid appear even less concerned with their “Buy now pay later” mantra. Without involving newly emerging financially spoiled Getafe or Malaga it still appears that however we try to douse the flames of cynicism surrounding La Blaugrana’s astounding continuous success, they always appear to handle it with style, dignity and sensibility. In my belief, a measure of which every aspiring club should measure itself, not only within Spain but throughout Europe.
Football Orphan will return after the International break.
Football Orphan: Pep moves one trophy closer to his Barca exit.
Jose promised us that his teams will always provide supporters with a better second season. His plea last season with clasped hands was, please don’t judge us on this season the next one will be different. Well, for the most part Real Madrid looked a stronger and more cohesive prospect, until a majestically weighted pass from Messi split the Madrid defense wide open, only for Andres Iniesta to make a difficult finish look effortless. Ronaldo looked to have claimed the equalizer, but it may go to the dubious goal panel before it’s resolved who scored the equalizer. Just before half time from a scrambled corner, the ironically named Gerard Pique Bernabeu back healed an inch perfect pass to Messi before he calmly chipped home past Casillas with his usual touch of class. Oddly enough it was Ronaldo who was given the task of marking Messi for the corner. At very least, as Messi cheerily put away his second goal of the tie Ronaldo saw at close quarters, exactly the measure of class he should aspire to.
If Mourinho is to make significant progress in closing the gulf in class between his current and his former employers, he has his work cut out trying to quell the erratic behaviour of three of their back four. Pepe, Sergio Ramos and Marcello gamble on being sent off in almost every game.
Indeed as predicted, an enormous melee ensued after the Brazilian Marcelo lashed out at substitute Cesc Fabregas on the stroke of full-time earning himself a straight red. With the resulting fracas, the already substituted David Villa and Mesut Ozil also played themselves into a dismissal.
The unnecessary and unsavory end to the game completely over shadowed a great advertisement for Spanish football. What promised to be a fine curtain raiser descended into farce yet again. Barca had looked entirely comfortable at two one up as Benzema leveled, before yet again Messi spectacularly beat Casillas to claim the Spanish Super Cup for the Catalans.
This leaves Pep Guardiola level with Johan Cruyff with the most silverware won as a Barcelona coach. It is widely believed that Guardiola would step down once he had eclipsed his former coach.With La Liga, Copa Del Rey, Champions League, European Super Cup and World Club Cup still up for grabs for La Blaugrana, it would be virtually impossible to see Barca end the season with only the Spanish Super Cup to their name, which would surely culminate with the inevitable search for a new coach.
Football Orphan : Arsenal bid an emotional “Comiat” to Cesc.
Cesc Fabregas finally made his long-awaited move back to his boyhood team yesterday. He revealed that he could barely speak through the emotion of the farewells when thanking Arsene Wenger who he see’s as a father figure. Much has been made of arguably the most important signing Barcelona have made since Johan Cruyff signed for the Catalans in 1973. No single eventuality could possibly have had a bigger feel good factor for Los Cules than Cesc’s “homecoming” this season. The hole that Fabregas leaves at Arsenal will be of little concern to La Blaugrana as they strengthen what is an already invincible and virtually flawless team.
Arsene Wenger has been accused of a variety of flaws over the course of the infamous barren years. With the mass exodus that Arsenal find themselves in the midst of currently, this is surely the Frenchman’s biggest challenge yet. Wenger has already seen the likes of Almunia, Clichy, Denilson and Fabregas depart, with Eboue, Bendtner and Nasri currently believed to be packing their bags. Arsenal have also sold Jay Emmanuel Thomas to Ipswich Town when he was once believed to be a hot prospect, and have sent Kyle Bartley out on loan to Glasgow Rangers yet again. I personally believe that a proactive approach by the north Londoners could see a galvanizing effect on the Emirates faithful. It won’t be the “be all and end all” to get talented players, it just won’t be enough. The mentality of the new recruits will be scrutinised by media and supporters as much as ever.
Why “Le Professeur” hasn’t shown more of an interest in “budget” players such as Scott Parker, Craig Bellamy and perhaps even Owen Hargreaves and Mathew Upson on free transfers given the reluctance to spend money is a mystery to me. Arsenal in my opinion need what Liverpool have recently encouraged with their own signings, is an experienced British core in their first eleven. At the risk of hanging myself out to dry just like Alan Hanson once did, but with so little title-winning experience, I just don’t share Arsene Wenger’s optimism.
The prospect of Arsenal’s most experienced and most important player now entering into an environment to complete his education and qualifying himself as the “complete package” must now show Wenger he needs to buck the trend, and rethink his philosophy if silverware is to find its way back down south to N5.
Football Orphan: Nobody remembers second place. Speculate to accumulate.
"Silent Stan" at the Emirates
Francesc Fabregas must be thinking that he will be playing a high-profile Derby match in the wrong city tonight. While Arsenal are potentially attending their own funeral at White Hart Lane, Cesc’s boyhood club Barcelona will be preparing for their Copa Del Rey final against Real Madrid.
Barcelona could put the finishing touches to the first part of another treble while Arsenal remain without a trophy in six seasons. The impatience of Fabregas is becoming more and more evident. In a recent interview with Spanish magazine Don Ballon, Fabregas stated that Wenger would have been sacked by now had he been managing at a Spanish club. He also revealed that he is fed up saying that they played well without winning and that Arsenal must choose between winning trophies or developing players.
This does not sound like a man happy in the workplace. Once a player really starts to make those kind of noises, it’s only a matter of time before he moves on. Previously Arsene Wenger had immaculate judgement when letting players move on, this time it looks as though he may have missed the boat on getting top price for a player who quite obviously has major hamstring issues.
Once the Spaniard eventually leaves Arsenal unless there is alterations in recruitment policy, the spotlight will inevitably shift on to the next high-profile player. While Wenger is exceptional at accumulating top dollar for players, he is subdued when it comes to extinguishing the speculation when it obviously is counter productive to the team.
Jack Wilshere is quite an obvious replacement while Aaron Ramsey has made fantastic progress since his unfortunate leg break. Henri Lansbury has also been incredibly impressive on loan at Norwich as they seek automatic promotion to the Premier League. This point I feel is of utmost importance. Arsenal were the first club to field an all foreign first eleven, but they have made extraordinary strides turning around that philosophy while nurturing some of the best home based talent which also includes left back Kieran Gibbs.
Wenger appears to be moving closer and closer to the emphatically successful Barcelona template of home-grown players, but will the difference of a marquee player in the transfer market remain as Arsenal’s undoing? It’s high time that “Silent Stan” (Kroenke) teaches Arsene Wenger how to speculate to accumulate.
Football Orphan 