Lliga | Round 22: FC Barcelona - Atlético de Madrid 2-1

[Barcilliant]

The best thing is we are winning when we are not playing well.
This rarely happened during the Pep hey days.

 

[SeloBarca]

well, barca had best defence last season, why do we forget that? under guardiola, midfield was best in barcelona, now, under enrique, attack is the best, of course you set game plan for fast passing ball to attackers, there is nothing bad about it. No need to worry, real and atletico are worse in the league, in champions league we will see. Barca will win la liga. After this season barca needs to improve defence, i love masche but i think he is ready to go, alves also.

I dont beleive we really had the "best defence" last year. It was more a matter of us keeping the ball in attack so our defence didnt get tested to much.
When the defence actually got challanged they made alot of misstakes.

I agree with Luft that our defence and mid is not to good against better teams. Apart from Iniesta and Busquetes the rest are not able to cope with preassure and dont have the dribblingskills to make their man, or passingskills.
I still miss Xavi to control our midfield, a playertype we dont have anymore.
it forces Messi to move into the mid to distribute since noone else is good enough to do it.
Rafinha is not better than Rakitic and Roberto and wont make it better. Denis is worse than all of them, dont know why were getting someone to just take space on the bench.

Guardiola team was more balanced with good overall in defence mid and attack. Now, we have an awesome attack but mediocre mid and defence.

Dont really like the "fatigue" argument either. Other teams play as much games and still have the stamina.
I still think were the best team in the world right now though, just that we could be even better.

 

[Luftstalag14]

Arsenal scouts were seen at Camp Nou watching this game and I bet other CL competitors of ours were watching it too and I am afraid they will take a page from Simeone's playbook: Press the hell out of us and force errors and mispasses. This has become our Achilles heel that we apparently have nothing to counter this pressing and all we can do seems to be waiting for them to get tired later so we can turn things around.

Yeah we won many key games given our tight schedule. But the fashion in which we won some of these games was hardly convincing. We can't always count luck to be on our side. Luis Enrique wasn't satisfied with our performance today either and I hope he can really address the key issues before we start our tough CL campaign.

Finally from a team-development perspective this team badly needs some balance waist down. When MSN is out/out of form/having an off day, what do we do?

 

[instinct]

I would love Arsenal to press high up the pitch. Their defense is known for not being able to handle a fast counter attack. And we're not talking about a midtable EPL clubs, we're talking about 3 of the best players in the world.

Bring it on.

 

[KingLeo10]

Arsenal scouts were seen at Camp Nou watching this game and I bet other CL competitors of ours were watching it too and I am afraid they will take a page from Simeone's playbook: Press the hell out of us and force errors and mispasses. This has become our Achilles heel that we apparently have nothing to counter this pressing and all we can do seems to be waiting for them to get tired later so we can turn things around.

Yeah we won many key games given our tight schedule. But the fashion in which we won some of these games was hardly convincing. We can't always count luck to be on our side. Luis Enrique wasn't satisfied with our performance today either and I hope he can really address the key issues before we start our tough CL campaign.

Finally from a team-development perspective this team badly needs some balance waist down. When MSN is out/out of form/having an off day, what do we do?

that's why they're MSN all 3 are match winners in their own right, probability is on our side when it comes to whether all three have an off day on the exact same day

 

[DonAK]

Arsenal scouts were seen at Camp Nou watching this game and I bet other CL competitors of ours were watching it too and I am afraid they will take a page from Simeone's playbook: Press the hell out of us and force errors and mispasses. This has become our Achilles heel that we apparently have nothing to counter this pressing and all we can do seems to be waiting for them to get tired later so we can turn things around.

Yeah we won many key games given our tight schedule. But the fashion in which we won some of these games was hardly convincing. We can't always count luck to be on our side. Luis Enrique wasn't satisfied with our performance today either and I hope he can really address the key issues before we start our tough CL campaign.

Finally from a team-development perspective this team badly needs some balance waist down. When MSN is out/out of form/having an off day, what do we do?

There's one thing replicating it, and there's another thing pulling it off.

No disrespect to Arsenal, but I really doubt in their ability to implement it successfully.

 

[barcafan161]

So what's the general feeling about this game then? Haven't seen it yet

 

[Truthist]

I would love Arsenal to press high up the pitch. Their defense is known for not being able to handle a fast counter attack. And we're not talking about a midtable EPL clubs, we're talking about 3 of the best players in the world.

Bring it on.

They have the players to hurt us too and the pace in their side worries me.

 

[Luftstalag14]

There's one thing replicating it, and there's another thing pulling it off.

No disrespect to Arsenal, but I really doubt in their ability to implement it successfully.

They can counter and they counter really well.

By the way on Arsenal: Alexis and Coquelin are back, Wilbeck will be back any day now, Wilshire and Carzola might make it too.

 

[instinct]

They have the players to hurt us too and the pace in their side worries me.

If they decide to press like Atleti, they'd either have to play a very high line or leave space between their midfield and their defense. Both approaches are incredibly dangerous against this Barça team.
1.) Mertesacker and Koscielny (Gabriel) will never ever keep up with Messi, Neymar and Suarez in a 1v1.
2.) Our midfield is much stronger than theirs. If they leave space in the middle due to their pressing, Iniesta and Rakitic will have an easy time passing the ball to our forwards and then...I refer back to 1.)

Won't be as easy as it sounds but we're definitely stronger than them in every aspect of the game. Of course they have players that can hurt us, it's the CL.

I'm very confident.

P.S To every Arsenal fan reading this: I hate your club.

 

[Catalan Fan]

We've played some tough, physical games lately and come through them pretty well result wise.I know it's not been that convincing to watch at times (Espanyol 1st half was dreadful), but I honestly think the result today was ALL that mattered.

We played our direct rivals, who tried to kick us off the park and beat them (again).We win our game in hand and we are in the box seat to win la liga imo.We have every chance of making the Copa final, against a stuttering Valencia and MSN will (again imo) rip Arsenal's defence apart in CL.

I'm usually quite cautious about what we can achieve, but am beginning to think the unthinkable.

 

[Alik]

We have won 8 games in a row, and have not lost in I don't know how many.

We are making massive headway towards securing the domestic double following a treble-winning season, and still people are worried about the state of Barça

Can we enjoy this, and stop taking it for granted?

 

[Catalan Fan]

They have the players to hurt us too and the pace in their side worries me.

They're no Leicester

 

[barcafan161]

3 points clear at the top and 7 over Real...no issues here

 

[KingLeo10]

We have won 8 games in a row, and have not lost in I don't know how many.

We are making massive headway towards securing the domestic double following a treble-winning season, and still people are worried about the state of Barça

Can we enjoy this, and stop taking it for granted?

i share your sentiment. and it's unbeaten across 26 games and lucho achieved most of that with a depleted squad, both on account of injuries and the transfer ban.