I came home at 7:30 today, and watched the second leg of the supercopa, which took me 4 hours (I turned the tv off at midnight). Why? Cuz I stopped at so many points, turned it on again, rewinded it, and repeated this for about 10~15 different times in the match. In particular, I watched one pass no less than 7 times. My mom counted, puzzled as I drew numbers an arrows on a piece of scrap paper over and over again.
Why all this you wonder? To answer the question – Should I feel sorry for Real Madrid?
Why I feel sorry for Madrid – They played a great game over both legs of the supercopa. There is no longer that difference of class evident in previous clasicos. In games we saw in the last two years between the two, Madrid might have drawn Barcelona, they certainly lost on some unlucky conceding at times, and they definitely had some outrageous calls go against them by certain divers in the Barcelona camp. But deep down, we all knew that they were on the backfoot, and it was about stopping Barcelona rather than taking control.
Now its different. This year, over the two supercopa legs that I’ve had the pleasure of scrutinizing, and I can definitively say: the gulf is GONE. There is no gap there. They are playing an equal game and now Barca is sweating. I feel sorry for Madrid because a) they should have won the supercopa purely based on the flow of gameplay 2) Messi at Barcelona is god in cleats. He just cannot be stopped. Period. One too many times over the last 5 years, as was the case tonight, was Barcelona able to win due to him being the ruthless finisher that he is. Tonight, the Barcelona midfield was doing jack shit. Literally JACK SHIT. The brilliance of Xavi? Please. Passes aimless, circling it around the back, Busquets spreading it around the back four. Is that considered possession? Sure. Are they doing anything with it? No. Its exactly when like my friend Moose and I pass it around the defense to not concede for the last half of a tournament match in order to preserve a lead. Yea we end up with 70% possession, but anyone who actually watched the game and didn’t read an article would be wiser, and would know better. In a word, it was pathetic. But when all is lost, you give it to Messi. A blind cross, boot it up, and the little magician make something of it. Because that’s what the best player of our generation is capable of. And no one, not Carvalho, not Pepe, not Casillas (he did MORE than enough tonight), and certainly not the positional boneheads that are Sergio Ramos and Marcelo are going to do anything about it. That’s why I feel sorry for Madrid.
Why do I not feel sorry for Madrid? They had plenty of chances to finish the game. I am understanding why Mourinho prefers literally anyone over Benzema if and when they are fully fit. Benzema will score nice goals. He’s just the type of player that will labor in scoring the difficult ones, yet find it impossible to score the little ones. Even tonight, he hit the ugliest one, when he had 2 clear cut chances that could have found the back of the net with a little composure. Fanboys who don’t watch the games and only read articles about games are now gonna say to me, oh he scored hat tricks last year blah blah blah – and I will say a) Congratulations, b) watch a fucking game before you open your mouth c) Emile Heskey dropped hat tricks on Derby County, should we all give Benz credit for dropping three against Auxerre? Had he made his chances, which to be honest were not difficult ones, Madrid would have won easy tonight. No question. Without doubt, some of Madrid’s impotent conversion rate was due to stellar goalkeeping from Victor Valdes, who had a fantastic game. But the Madridistas did him so many favors by making it so damn easy. Ramos missed a sitter. Ronaldo missed a couple as well. Add Ozil to the list. Heck, if Madrid’s forwards did as well as to finish the ball as they did to get it in the penalty box, they would have held that trophy. So in conclusion, they are the only ones to blame for missing shots! There is no excuse, and nothing to say in getting around that. If you are going to miss easy chances, you don’t deserve to win. Simple. Cruel. That is football sometimes.
The good thing for Madrid is that Mourinho has done it. He’s figured out a gameplan for Madrid against Barca and it works. I’ve seen it in 180 minutes. It really works. But he needs a couple things to win the Barca games this year. Better finishing drills for his front men, including Ozil and Kaka, and better training of the fullbacks. Sergio Ramos is a great right back going forward. But everyone knows he is no where near world class as a pure defender. Fabio Coentrao was great in the world cup. But to face Barca, you need to be better than that. The thing that sucks about training a back line is that they are only as good as their weakest link. If one fails to track a runner, the mark balance will break, and it will be over. Much like a Spartan phalanx. If one shield fails, so will the other. In Barca’s first goal tonight, Ricardouche Carlvalyouche inexplicably stopped tracking Iniesta. Just let him go. Decided it wasn’t worth pursuing. Messi through passes, Pepe, bewildered, runs after Iniesta, who chips it over Casillas.
It is the most difficult part of the team to train well. But when its done right (Inter’s Champs League year), it’s like a machine, and its fucking gorgeous to watch. Watching a purposeful, decisive, defensive unit in a team gets my attention so much more than tiki taka passing up front. It really does. Any team can play beautiful touch football if the opposition is weaker, or if the opposition adopts stand off defending. But not any team can produce a consistently mistake-less, strong-knit, anticipatory back line. In any case, if the Special One is able to tweak this things over the rest of the season, before they face Barca in any meaningful fixtures, I now have full faith that he will be able to beat them this year.
Now, as it is imperative now to address this, yes, Jose Mourinho was unprofessional to stab Tito Villanova in the eyes. That was straight up childish. Jose saw his chance, and he went for it, and it was hilarious. He can be that way. But it was extremely unprofessional as the manager of the world’s most decorated football club. Having said that, Barca again complaining about him destroying Spanish football is worse to me because it is wildly hypocritical. They seem to have forgotten memories of Barca before the Johan showed up, when in fact Mourinho’s tactics would have been embraced with glee at the Nou. Who started using the 5 back prominently in europe? el volantes? What, you don’t remember the early 70’s Barca? Yeah I bet you don’t. People always remember what they want to remember don’they. Bandwagoners of Barca these days, idiots who don’t even know Cruyff is, or how a 4-3-3 even functions, will whine about how Madrid’s “defensive football” is destructive to the spanish game. It takes every ounce of patience in me to hold back insults at moronic imbeciles like that.
As I knew I would, I digress. My second point was that Barca also seems to completely ignore the fact that most of the fights started in Spanish football against Barca (the very fights where they always act like the victims and say its destroying spanish football), whether it be hercules, sevilla, malaga, deportivo, or madrid, always seem to start with one or more of Pedro, Alves, Masch, and Busquets rolling on the ground for seemingly no reason. The hypocrisy. Ugh. I’m going to bed.
The Beautiful Game 