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Zlatan Ibrahimovic (28) has been the subject of a lot of heated FC Barcelona fan discussions lately. After being transferred to FC Barcelona from FC Internazionale Milano this season in a swap deal that included Samuel Eto’o (28) and a sum of money as the transfer fee, Ibrahimovic quickly garnered media and fans’ attention.
Rugby players love to taunt us that “Football is a gentleman’s game played by hooligans.” The same sentiment applies to professional sports journalists in Spain.
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Another round of international games brings with it that same old question: why is Victor Valdes constantly overlooked by the manager and coaching staff of the Spanish national squad?
Currently, the Barca keeper finds himself in the form of his life, having just completed the most succesful season in footballing history. Yet, with numerous top-class performances to his name, he somehow still finds himself left out in the cold by Vicente del Bosque and co., and although as Barca fans, we have come to expect the ommision of Valdes’ name from any potential Spain squad list, it does seem unthinkable that he is not at least third choice in the pecking order of current Spanish keepers.
As we speak, he is leading the race for the prestigous Zamora award ahead of Spain’s prefered number one Iker Casillas, with the Barca man having let in just 13 goals in the league during this campaign, as opposed to the 17 conceded by Iker. Both players are far ahead of Spain’s second and third choice keepers when it comes to goals conceded; Liverpool’s Pepe Reina has been beaten 28 times, Villareal’s Diego Lopez 37 times. With stats like that, you really do begin to question just why Victor isn’t getting a chance.
The performance of Dutch referee Bjorn Kuipers has come under close scrutiny in the Spanish and German press, with some claims that the referee favored Barcelona in the way he called their Champions League encounter against Stuttgart last Tuesday in Germany.
Articles in Madrid sports dailies Marca and As on the day of the game pointedly asked their readers why Stuttgart were not awarded penalties for a Gerard Pique handball (min 29), and for an alleged foul by defender Rafael Marquez on Timo Gebhart (min 41). Both of these controversial decisions were highlighted with video and still images, but only As initially mentioned Barcelona’s strong claim for an unawarded penalty, as Stuttgart defender Cristian Molinaro seemed to make a goal-line clearance of an Zlatan Ibrahimovic shot with his arm [min 69]. Neither publication mentioned Sami Khedira’s professional foul on Lionel Messi late in the game which could have been punished with a red card [min 90].
These stories continue a recent trend in Spanish football journalism claiming that Barcelona has been receiving favorable treatment from Liga referees, and evolve in a context where controversial refereeing decisions at all levels have come under greater scrutiny by teams, officials, and fans alike.
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No matter what happens on the field for FC Barcelona, whether it be the glorious heights of free-flowing, high-scoring total-football or the dreary toothlessness of recent games, it seems there has been one question that has haunted Barcelona fans for nearly eighteen months now: is Sergio Busquets, 21, actually good enough for regular first-team selection?
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As promised, we are back with the second edition of Ramzi Tanani’s writings in his brand new column here at totalBarça – Ramzi’s Rambles.
We can talk all day long about the loss of Keita, Xavi, Abidal, and whoever will fail to make it for the game against Racing, but time will prove (hopefully) that the game against Atletico was not the beginning of crisis, it was the bottom of the crises’ well. Now the team will start recovering. The problem against Atletico was the string of injuries and suspensions all coming together against a team that is used to complicating Barcelona’s Liga adventure even while selecting all the key players.
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It seems that the question on many people’s lips at the moment is whether Thierry Henry is on his way out of FC Barcelona. The striker has repeatedly been linked with moves away from the Camp Nou in this summer’s upcoming transfer window, with moves to America’s MLS, or big spending Manchester City the most notable rumours concerning the Frenchman’s future. But what exactly has brought on such discussion?
After all Titi was an integral part of the Triplet winning side from last season, playing 42 games in all competitions for the club, scoring 25 goals and creating 11 assists in the process. Strong numbers by any stretch of the imagination, especially when you consider Henry’s advancing years, he will be 33 in the summer. In fact judging by facts and figures alone last season was the striker’s strongest showing for some time. The last time he got 20 goals+ at club level being the 2005-06 season at Arsenal.
FC Barcelona are in a defensive crisis and have yet again turned to La Masia as a remedy. Injuries to Dani Alves, Eric Abidal, Yaya Toure and Dmytro Chygrynskiy, in addition to the suspensions of Gerard Pique and Rafa Márquez, have left the Barca defense wanting, especially for the league game against Atletico Madrid at the Vicente Calderon.
So delicate is the situation that Guardiola will have only three first team defenders in Puyol, Milito and Maxwell available for the match. Hence, the Barça coach has called up three defenders from the academy, namely Marc Bartra, Albert Dalmau, and Marc Muniesa to cover for the injured defenders.
At this point, the mystery remains as to who amongst these three would start at the Calderon. This article gives you a brief insight about the three youngsters:
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Starting this week we will be bringing to you a fresh new weekly column from someone whom many of you might remember from FCB Transfers days. totalBarca is proud to collaborate with Football Mood and exclusively bring to you writings from the mind of Ramzi Tanani in his very own weekly column – Ramzi’s Rambles.
It may be an exaggeration to call Dani Alves and Eric Abidal unsung heroes. Alves was but a dream for Barcelona fans for a few seasons before being signed. Later on, he received more praise than the Cesar of Rome. Abidal was not an extremely popular player since day one, but now his role is highly appreciated by fans. Still, the question remains: Does anyone rate this fullback partnership as essential, compared to the Messi/Ibra combination for example?
Until the whistle blows in Madrid this Sunday, no one will know how FC Barcelona’s defense will respond to the blizzard of injuries that has struck the unit over the past ten days. But that leaves a full week for sportswriters to speculate, exaggerate, bloviate and deliver unwanted advice. True, the injury bug seems to have caught up with us culés after half a season of near-perfect health. And true again that muscle tears have proved contagious among our talented back line players. The defensive starters left untouched by injury are serving disciplinary suspensions, and the sporting press are beating the drums of “Crisis!”
author: Phil Ball
source: Soccernet
date: 02 February 2010
editing: totalbarca
“Successful football is about good habits,” quoth Brian Clough, more or less in those words. Maybe so. What he meant was that you inculcate good habits into a player on the training ground to the extent that the player then reproduces them automatically on match-days, usually without the manager’s further intervention.
Clough, for one, was famous for not turning up for training sessions, preferring to take his dog for a walk, which was his implicit way of acknowledging that the habits had been taken on. Vicente Del Bosque is another one from this school of management, preferring not to change the well-oiled Luis Aragonés machine, and only applying fine-tuning when necessary.
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author: Didac Peyret
source: Soccernet
date: 02 February 2010
editing: totalbarca
Arsene Wenger believes that top clubs have to make compromises to ensure they play in their own recognisable style – he believes clubs have no hope of making their mark on history without implementing a clear philosophy on the field. For Wenger, the biggest and best sides have a responsibility to the game and must show others what can be achieved.
Everybody has now seen the success of such a model in place at Barcelona. Bringing together an unlikely mixture of art and efficiency, Barca have shown that it is possible to break away from the cautious tactics that have characterised the modern game to win every trophy available to them in 2009.
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Yup. The subject is being brought up yet again. This time it’s your turn to do the debating, state the facts, and argue your points. The question is: Who should be the left-winger for next season?
In this EXCLUSIVE totalBarça article you’ll find:
- a list of over 40 possible candidates for the left-wing position that have been linked to FC Barcelona
- a link to the players profiles on Wikipedia
- a video showcasing their talents and skills
- a poll of the top-10 realistic candidates
- a place to discuss and share your thoughts and ideas about this issue
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Confessions of a writer
I have a confession. This is a subject I have been anxious to write about ever since the signing of Dmytro Chygrynskiy (‘Chyggy’ henceforth in this article), and although I tried to wait until more appearances, I decided to write it now amidst the increasing criticism over the Ukrainian’s performances and transfer.
As you can presume by the title, I am not going to speak of Chyggy alone, but rather enquire about the back four combinations that include him, and the differences between them. The main focus, also hinted in the title, will be the partnership with Gerard Pique, who is arguably Barcelona’s first choice CB, taking into account the problems of benching Puyol.
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Original article @ http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/nov/15/pep-guardiola-barcelona-coach
Author: John Carlin
The Observer, Sunday 15 November 2009
Pep Guardiola sits in the Barcelona dressing room listening, rapt, to some harpsichord variations by Johann Sebastian Bach. The players watch their coach in mute bafflement. When the music ends, Guardiola stands up, wipes the tears from his cheeks, turns to the players and, in no way diminishing their confusion, urges them to improve their minds by reading. “The whole of life is contained in books,” he enthuses, “the poetry, the prose…”
Embarrassment, sheer rage. David has defeated Goliath and the Beast’s reign of supreme terror is over. Rubin Kazan yesterday downed a full strength Football Club Barcelona as the Achilles heel of Barcelona was well and truly exposed.
Barcelona started out the game with winning being the only thought in their minds, a thought portrayed by the chosen line up of Barcelona manager Pep Guardiola comprising Valdes, Alves, Pique, Marquez, Abidal, Xavi, Toure, Iniesta, Messi, Ibrahimovic and Pedro. And it seemed to be a winning combination right from kick-off as the first move of the game saw Iniesta parade through the Rubin defence only to be blocked by the charging Sergei Ryzhikov as calls for a penalty were waved away by the soon to be despised match official Laurent Duhamel. The ball was cleared up field only to be calmly controlled by Rafael Marquez who passed it off with ease to Pique. Oh how I wish that I could say that that previous statement were true! I long to say that Marquez dealt with the ball like any Centre Back should, however if I were to then I would not be doing my job.
As the ball sailed afield Marquez’s attempted clearance went horribly wrong as the ball fell enticingly to one Aleksandr Ryazantsev who needed no further invitation as he caught Valdes off guard, scoring a blinder from 30 yards out giving Rubin Kazan - after a mere two minutes, a shock lead.
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Johan Cruyff writes a weekly column in Spanish newspaper, El Periodico. In this edition, Cruyff analyses the extension of Lionel Messi’s contract. You can find the piece after the jump.
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Transfer Approach
It’s no mystery Barcelona’s youth products is one of the main reasons for her recent success. Breeding talented footballers has made ‘La Masia’ one of the best youth nurturing facilities worldwide, if not the best.
But These last two seasons summer transfer window has shown us that you do not have to go through all of Barcleona’s youth ranks to play in Barcelona. As of late, it seems Barcelona are looking worldwide for talented young footballers who are in their second decade, in order to integrate them into the team.
However, it seems that this transfer approach is not likened by no other than the boss himself, Pep Guardiola, and when the manager and the board disagree about something, that something is in a problem, because while the board is ultimately the one who chooses who is in the squad, the manager is the one that decides who plays, and while the relationship of the club with the likes of Traffic sports agency, makes it easier to buy players, there is no promising that these player answer the requirements of the manager, and in the case of Guardiola, who can argue with success?
After last season, Guardiola has more power than a manager usually has, and the longer the team wins, the more powerful he will be come, and while he views the cantera products as the squad’s core, it seems he ignores these talented footballers Barcelona buy.
The three cases we are about to talk about involve three players Martin Caceres, Henrique, and Keirrison.
3 transfers, 3 Loans, 40 million euros – Wasted?
Beginning this month, totalBarca will present to you the three best Barca players of each month. The rankings would be based on the votes that you, our esteemed readers, had given to the players after each match that month, in our regular poll on matchdays - ”Man of the Match”. All the more reason for you to keep an even closer eye on every Blaugrana player as they run, slide, shoot and tackle not just for goals and match points, but also for your votes.
Johan Cruyff writes a weekly column in Spanish newspaper, El Periodico. In this edition, Cruyff analyses the title-race. Barcelona and Real Madrid have won their five matches and notched up a maximum of 15 points so far, left the other teams behind in the dust.
There is not one football fan in the world that does not know the name ‘Lionel Messi‘, and after the famous ‘Tripleta’ last season the same can be said about ‘Andres Iniesta‘ – the man who made the blues go blue. But all that success came with a price.the
Iniesta played the Champions League final injured and consequently was grounded for three months, while it took him a couple more weeks to make his season debut. Being an integral part of the best team in the world, and one it’s best performers last season, it was a bit worrying how Barcelona will handle without him. The last time he was injured, on November 2008, Barcelona struggled in their league games and looked out of shape.
Looking for a cover to the ghost face midfielder, there were a lot of options:
It was decided right from the second the transfer window was opened. Samuel Eto’o was not going to continue on at Football Club Barcelona. In turn after tedious negations a deal was struck as Eto’o was sent on his way to Italian champions Internazionale Milano with Swedish striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic establishing a new home in Catalunya.
Apart from moneybags Real Madrid’s capture of Cristiano Ronaldo and Kaka, the transfer saga of Eto’o and Ibra was one of the major talks of the pre-season.
Ibrahimovic’s less than impressive Champions League goalscoring record cast a cloud over his head and despite being a proven player with a superb league record the man they call Ibracadabra got off to a less than magnific start as he had minimum possession in his first few games and wasted chances left, right and center. However the 6ft 5 forward has slowly began to find his way in Spain and as one watched on while Sergio Busquets paraded down the left before slicing a sublime throughball into the on running Ibrahimovic who despite being on the wrong side for a right footer managed to deliciously loft a ball over Atletico Madrid goalkeeper Roberto.
Two rounds in La Liga have resulted in 5 goals, two clean sheets, and six points. After two matches in La Liga last year, Barca had scored one goal, conceded one and had just one point. At that point Barcelona had just played the qualifying round for Champions League. Now they have won two Super Cup titles. Those days they questioned the coach, the committee and the sporting direction, which everyone supports these days. It’s day and night in only one year. A complete change. You start as a champion in everything, and lead La Liga after two rounds. Anyhow I was more comfortable last year after a loss in Numancia, and a tie at home against Racing. The one point told me more than the six points Barca has gained now.
The first 45 minutes against Getafe were quite bad. And this time you can’t use excuses that they parked the bus in front of their goal. Michel’s team was better for an hour. Not because of the absentees, but because of those present. Barca played the ball around very slow. Few combinations and many players kept the ball without passing. Was there no value in the participated players? If you think so, you’ll be wrong, since the key players can’t always play. And if they did, you could see that their integrity and effort had an influence. I know very well that Messi, Iniesta and Alves are very good. And I know that the best was decisive in the end.
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