FC Barcelona welcomes Leverkusen while glad UCL rival won’t be from Russia
It’s no secret FC Barcelona never liked playing far up north, especially during the winter months, and thus welcomes the pick of Bayer Leverkusen as their opponent for the next round of this season’s Champions League. It showed in its President’s and Sporting director’s comments to reporters and in the players’ tweets after today’s last-16 draw.
Sandro Rosell, when asked, admitted his gladness for avoiding the two Russian clubs, CSKA Moscow and FC Zenit St. Petersburg.
“Every team has its pros and cons. For example the Russian teams. We would have preferred not to have faced them due to the plane trip, having to travel a day before, and for the cold, but then [on the plus side] they are [still] in pre-season.”
Zubizarreta reminisced about the time when he last faced the Germans as a player. “When their name came out I remember that I’d played against them before, and they knocked us out of the UEFA Cup. We hope that will not set a precedent and we can overcome them.”
“Last year they were the revelation of the season. I like German football. It’s competitive and seems to me a nice tie to play.”
Cesc Fabregas meanwhile echoes Rosell’s gratefulness in his tweet: “Well, we have to travel to Germany. Bayer 04 Leverkusen, German teams are always very strong. We have avoided the Russians. Good.”
The tweets from Pique and Iniesta however showed a differing view of the upcoming encounter. The defender is pleased, saying, “We have drawn Bayer Leverkusen! Not bad! I’ve always wanted to play in a German stadium. There will be a great atmosphere for football,” while Iniesta is a tad cautious: “Indeed, we already know our [next] opponent, Bayer Leverkusen. It certainly won’t be easy!”
guys,did u think that why i said we’ll defeat them 2-0 in bayarena!in last my comment!
Pay attention to number of our goals in away games this year in UCL.
Bate 0-5 Barca.
Plzen 0-4 Barca.
Milan 2-3 Barca.
Leverkusen 0/?-2 Barca.
If it continues Thanks God that we can score at least 1 goal in last 1/4.
But i dont like that we cant score in semifinal! But if we can gain good result in camp nou,not important.
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cool story, bro
I completely agree with all of this
He's translating the post to German
Glad we avoided Russions(guess Madrid can't say that) but Leverkusen is still a good team. Camp Nou shouldn't be a problem, but Leverkusen managed to win all 3 home matches this season.
Leverkusen is definitely beatable since they so far didn't have the best season and are only slowly getting better albeit many setbacks like a draw in the last CL game that pushed them to 2nd place for good.
They are currently 6th in Bundesliga 1, Barca, as 1st in La Liga should own them very much.
5:0 – Camp Nou
3:0 – BayArena
Nice draw i would say. I think it is gonna be a nice tie and i cant wait it. I think German league is really fair one so i am pretty sure we will see two nice games. And seeing Leverkusen results i think they arent going to play bus parking so we should progress over two legs.
I am already missing Villa…. I hope that results wont suffer because of his absence. Is true he wasn't in goal scoring form lately but with such a class and experience he has he is indispensable for any team. Beside that Keita is going to African Nations Cup in January and February, Afellay is probably not going to return until middle of March,… Is gonna be tough beginning of 2012. I just hope this is it for this year since we really don't have any luck with injuries!
I am wondering if technical staff is thinking to enter the winter market or we will relay on the B-team for help … We will find out soon
Hmmmm..it will be very interesting, I think Barca will rely on the B team as shown from the past as we love to develop our own player, which is good…I wonder if they'll go for a cut-price Mr Fernando T.
I anticipate this with baited breath
you know what will bring tears to my eyes… barcelona signing ronaldinho on loan till the end of the season. brazilian league is over so it shouldn't be that hard to get him on loan and i know he will agree. ronaldinho in a barca shirt one more time, the thought is exciting on it's own. we don't need a signing though, i'm just saying who i prefer if they should decide upon it especially with keita gone for month like you said and with the way cesc and sanchez are being injured.
you´re my man. a ronaldinho return would be awesome!
We can only dream … Ronnie at the Camp Nou … what memories.
http://www.goal.com/en/news/9/england/2011/12/14/…
Torres is being put on sale for only 20million pounds!!!
I wonder if we should get him in January just for fun
…and if he doesn't play well then we'll just make him train with the second team…lol
I don't think we'll go for him on a more serious note though, simply because we have Jonathan Soriano, Isaac Cuenca, Pedro, Messi, Alexis and even Iniesta or Fabregas who can be played as forwards…
Poor Villa
P.S. lol, maybe we should buy Torres to cheer Villa up on the sidelines, or he could be a utility man and become the official cheerleader for Barca
you really like him, don't ya?h
Sorry, but we're not Madrid or Man City. We don't waste money on pointless players that can't contribute to the squad. Even if they are really good.
Wow…you have such a great sense of humor… :/
Thumb me down as much as you can….you obviously couldn't sense my sentences were dripping with sarcasm…why would we even spend 20 million pounds if we have Isaac Cuenca who has already scored two goals in La Liga, half of what Torres has managed to score in his entire Chelsea career….
I don't like when Rosell gets cocky..
Me tooL I don't like when Rosell gets bitchy
Don't like when he thinks we can beat everyone easily
i will miss villa's goal
he scores when barca need a goal, and remember villa's goals against real madrid (super copa), against milan, against manchester united.
He always scores fantastic curling long range efforts as well…thats the thing, he is unique, and his uniqueness is reflected in his goals…Get well soon David Villa.
I don't know why every1's happy to avoid russians. CSKA is the weakest team in the draw. Russian teams only start season in March, so they will be in bad form. Besides, it's not so cold in Moscow in Feb, and CSKA will play on artificial pitch, so no need to worry about bad pitch state. Madrid got the easiest draw
Because:
a) Russia is far away, long trip = lest rest time.
b) Russia in February is cold as hell = easy for injuries.
c) first few months of the year is always busy for La Liga teams.
@ Tlal it looks like you do not know what happens in soviet Russia!
OT: what do you guys think about us getting Drogba? His contract is up at the end of this season and he's not renewed so far. He's a big guy who's good in the air and can give us a different look (especially now with Cuenca who is an amazing crosser of the ball).
No thank you!
well, theoretically it is a good idea but its almost practically unfeasible. drogba is an older player (32 years old) than villa who commands sky-high wages (not good for our current financial situation.) he'll also have to adapt to the new league and barca's system of play ( and that'll be difficult, considering his age)
you highlighted really well possible negative attributes of his potential arrival.
But also you should mention his positive. He is still one of the best strikers around, despite his age. He was unlucky with malaria last season but otherwise he had great career. He practically scored a goal every two games. He is a unique player and I dont doubt his football abilities and i think he would give us another dimension which would for sure be positive for this team.
Also in 2007/08 season when he was thinking to leave Chelsea he said he would maybe also like to play for Barcelona and this was even before of the Guardiola era.
The negative thing is that also he goas to African Nations Cup so he would also be missing the part of the season we would need him most and the time he would need to adapt to way of playing and place of living would be non-existent so,…
Even if i would love to see him once play with our team i think is unrealistic to expect that.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic part 2. Quality player who doesn't fit the philosophy.
we have enough people in attack and all are excellent and wants to play hard :
Alexis : new players wants to win trophies and prove he is an amazing player .
pedro : wants to improve himself and win peps trust again .
messi : do i need to say anything !! messi is messi .
Soriano: wants to prove himself before getting sold next year, and who knows may get promoted to the first team , always been his dream .
Cuenca : getting better everyday .
afellay : should get back in april
WE should sign the chilean Eduardo Vargas. Only 8 million . I heard Chelsea will try to sign him. He's only 22 and he's really good. top scorer in South american Cup. best player of the tournament. Not to mention he has sublime technique and his team plays the barca style ( alittle more direct than barca) but just as beautiful. Loves the one two touches.
I don't think Pep will sing him
We don't need to sign anyone. The last thing I want is to be like Madrid and Man City where they have to bench world class players. Being a world class team means you have to let go. Where will Vargas fit in our team? The bench. Wasted talent. I hate how we don't trust our youth teams that much. I have faith in our future and signing more and more new players will just hinder their promotion to the first team.
For the ppl talking about possible Torres move.
If it's one place that Torres will be able to prosper its at Barca. He may have to play out on the left hand side but he can play dere and with the amount of chances we create in a game along with the sheer joy of being away from the English Media back in Spain under Pep with his world cup winning friends I can see him being much less pressured and actually enjoy his game.
However I dont see Chelsea giving up on their 5 yr, 50 million dollar investment so easily. They have to give him at least until the end of this season.
Yeah, we do need Torres. Our B team is struggling and I think Rafinha and Jonathan would love to have Torres as their partner up front.
a great champions league match up……..