Lliga | Round 26: Real Madrid - FC Barcelona 0-1

BarcaVillain said:

Sergi Roberto. Thought he'd be exposed today. Was an absolute giant.

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Very good game from him, true!

Forum keyboard managers vs Valverde. Gotta love back reading every match threads

Givenchy said:

fucking hell the Bob brigade will be unbearable if Roberto shuts down Vinicius

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ready

Joan said:

ready

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tbh rakitic put in a shift to help out bob practically every time vinicius threatened to break loose.

more so than either, props are due to valverde for making this key adjustment.

Not gonna lie. Valverde has taken Real Madrid's soul.

It feels so strange to say but this was one of the best defensive performances I've seen from this club. Hopefully, we stay solid at the back for the remainder of the season. That being said I do hope we improve in attack. On more than one occasion I noticed that we would defend a wave of attacks but wouldn't be able to cleanly pull off the transition to initiate a counter-attack. Dembele and Suarez were the culprits on a few occasions but I think some work still needs to be done with regards to positioning and opening channels when transitioning to counters.

Fuck RM. Beat these fuckers again. Buhu Vinicius so good.

But game was one of the best I saw from Barca in the recent years .
For the first time we looked like a absolute top tier team in defense and midfield. Not just a offensive gala group.

Rakitic masterclass
Piqué masterclass

Messi looked also more active but I think he has some discomfort

Leo_Messi said:

We will win once again. It was not a coincidence that RM did not convert any of their chances on Wednesday. They lack killers. Their most "dangerous" players a few days ago were a 31 year old Benzema who has never been a killer and a 18.5 year old Vinicius who has scored 3 goals while having had freaking 75 shots on goal!

Given our superior quality, total dominance in the domestic competitions, dominance in head to head matches in the past 10+ years and our incredible statistic at the Bernabéu, I cannot see us losing.

Messi won't have such a quite game again while Dembélé will be better too. Arthur might play as well and I doubt that even the likes of Valverde will commit the same mistake in leaving Semedo alone to counter Vinicius and Reguilón.

Anyway the most important game was Wednesday night (we played for a place in the CdR final and helped prevent RM win 1 of the 3 major trophies that both of us can win each season) and we can live with a draw although a win should be the goal as it always should.

Atlético will play against La Real at Anoeta tomorrow. I could very well see Atlético dropping points.

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Not the least surprised that RM was incompetent once again highlighted by Benzema, Vinicius (has to be the worst player that I have seen in a long while in front of goal, comical stuff, highlighted by that shot that went out for a freaking throw in ) and an invisible Bale.

Valverde deserves praise for having corrected the right flank. Unlike Semedo, Roberto received continuous defensive support from Rakitic (one of his better games this season), Busquets and Piqué (my MoM). Having said that Roberto was great individually which all the stats confirmed unlike Semedo who had a bad game on Wednesday. Granted under more difficult circumstances but still a bad game.

This time around we can talk about a great defensive performance by the team as a collective. Ter Stegen barely had any saves to make. Arthur's return greatly contributed to this and the fluidity of our play compared to Wednesday night. Messi had another relatively quiet game as did Dembélé despite creating danger often. Suárez overall play was better than on Wednesday expect for goals. A good sign as well.

What I would have liked to see more though, would be for the front-trio to press more but given Messi's usual defensive contribution and Suárez no longer being a youngster, that might be too much to ask for 72 hours after another El Clásico game. Dembélé's strength was never pressing either.

96-95.

Where them haters at?

Regarding our defensive performance:

I don't think we were that good defensively as many claim.

We relied far too much on last ditch tackles, MATS, and poor finishing from RM for my liking. They did create plenty of opportunities.

Damn....today even feels better.

We literally shattered their souls this week.

Alik said:

Regarding our defensive performance:

I don't think we were that good defensively as many claim.

We relied far too much on last ditch tackles, MATS, and poor finishing from RM for my liking. They did create plenty of opportunities.

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True. We got lucky few times.