Barca 2-1 Malaga, or, Last Season We Put Away 15

It is an understatement to say that I was very pleased with this match. However, as I watched, and then watched again, a creeping doubt entered my mind: what did Guardiola have to say about it? According to Goal.com's translation:

"The important thing is that we played very well, with excellent possession and control of the ball. It was one of our better home games. [. . .] We were far better than our last games."

Phew! After thinking I was going crazy after hearing his pretty sharp criticism of the admittedly-incomplete hammering of Malaga, I hear a blessing from the master, which gives validation to what I had in mind which was this:

Dear Lord, did Barca look good. Dear Lord. Did they look good. Very good. Exclamation point. Exclamation points. More of them.

Did Malaga lay down and take it? That is partly the case. More importantly, Barca never let them stand up. The way the team was spreading the ball from the wide left to the wide right, back and forth. The way the whole team cohesively defended, with everyone in the right position. The way each individual won their own one-on-ones, and the way many of them did even more than that. The way everyone moved. The simplicity and precision of every pass, dribble, and tackle...all these things made this performance one that could have left world-beating opposition completely stumped.

And mark my words, our best performances this season will come at home, from "The" starting XI of this year (minus Abidal): Valdes, Alves, Puyol, Pique, Maxwell, Busquets, Xavi, Iniesta, Pedro, Messi, and Ibrahimovic. Why do I rate Henry behind Pedro, and why do I rate Yaya behind Busquets? Because Guardiola does so on both counts, and because I am just starting to believe.

That said, I am not convinced that Barca is a better team this year than last year. Last year, Barca finished a great many of their chances. In the first half of this game alone, I counted eight quite gilt-edged chances. A sampling:

-9th: After a failed cross to Xavi from Pedro, with three other players in the box lurking, Messi touches the ball but cannot control. However, Busquets' pressure is immediate, and forces a bad pass to a man tracked by Alves, and the ball bounces back to Busquets without ever having crossed the halfway line. A few passes later, Xavi drags his marker forward before dropping back and receiving a pass from Pedro, who continued to run diagonally inside, and Pedro feeds him through a quite-tight angle. He touches it on to Messi, who lofts it to the wing for Alves, who makes a fool of his man, crosses in with the outside of his left foot, and nailed Messi's head at the far post. Messi's run was great, and whether he saw it late or not we will never know, but he missed the open net.

-14th: After a goal-kick is owned by Puyol in the air, and it comes to Iniesta upfield, who cannot control his space in the air. Malaga briefly recovers the ball, but they have their own problems with the bouncing ball. Within a half of a second, Messi pounces onto the ball and has a two-on-two situation. Being Messi, he leaves that unfortunate player in the dust, dashes into the box with Ibrahimovic to his right, but Weligton tackles the ball just as he takes the shot. Whether he should have taken the shot earlier or stopped and gave it to his partner, that should have been a real punishment.

-24th: Maxwell's header, one of the approximately one hundred (and 98%) he won all day from a goal kick, sends the ball bouncing into the middle. Xavi never has control of it to begin with, he has no right to it. But he sombreros the man running at him, then with the second touch, sombreros a second man running at him. The first comes at him for his third touch, which flicks it behind his standing leg and turns one of them. The second arrives and converges on the ball, but with the fourth touch, Xavi passes it in between both of his victims to Messi, who is fouled on the break. That was not a goal scoring opportunity--it was just awesome.

-26th: Another Maxwell defensive header finds Ibra, who uses his head to ping it back to Xavi. Busquets uses great composure to receive one of the not-so-great passes from Xavi under the pushes of two Malaga players, and gives it off to Messi, who runs off and gives to Pedro, wide open on the wing. Pedro jukes once, jukes twice, and beats the left fullback handily, puts in a peach of a cross into the path of a great run from Messi, who inexplicably heads it high.

-29th-30th: Busquets finds himself on the wing, and gives to the real winger, Pedro, who loses the ball with a loose touch. However, Busi chases his man immediately to the corner flag, and the fullback passes it forward expecting it to hit his winger--but Pedro had tracked the winger, and controlled-cum-passed it to Busi. In a real error, the fullback doesn't attack Busi (on the wide right) for several seconds, and he is allowed to pass it back into the midfield. The forward play falls into the midfield (and to the wide left), mainly through Xavi, and the midfield play falls into the defense (and the middle), mainly through Busi, before coming forth (to the wide right!) to Alves, who releases Messi at the corner of the box. Messi jukes once, jukes twice, finds himself in on goal...but honks it high, with Ibrahimovic waiting at the other side of the goal. I really do not know if that was supposed to be a shot or a cross.

-36th-37th: A Xavi set piece is headed out, but Xavi himself runs across to catch it and distribute it to Alves, who knocks it on to Pedro on the right wing, who absolutely tears his man to pieces with a simple turn and run. He should have crossed to Ibra on the far post, but instead he gives back to Xavi on the edge of the box, who moves about and gives to Iniesta on the left side. He keeps running though, and turns around, so that when Iniesta crosses it to him, he looks uber-cool, when he catches the ball with his studs and flicks it with decent pace on-target for the keeper to save. I do not rate that as a gilt-edged chance, it was just another most excellent Xavi-moment (and a great Pedro-moment, as well).

And that was just the first half. And, that is not to mention 1) an Alves cross that somewhat luckily came to Ibra, whose reactions were not quick enough, 2) a Busi header scuffed that came from a shortly-taken corner on the right that was crossed in from the left, 3) a piece of beat-three-then-pass Messi magic that should have been a Pedro one-touch assist and an Ibra counterattacking goal, and 4) another piece of Messi magic and teamwork with Pedro that would have been either a goal for Messi's portfolio or an always-coming scrapper from Iniesta. That is also not to mention that those last three came in the 43rd, 44th, and 47th minutes respectively. And thusly, I explain the title of this post. Last year, Messi is calmer with his touch and scores four. Busi scores also scores one with a calmer touch. Pedro's pass is perfect and Ibra doesn't have to stretch, like that goal from last year of Eto'o's, assisted with Henry's one-touch.

But I do not want to be negative because this was an absolute blitzkrieg, with the "style and discipline" that marks our best performances. Notice the main characteristics of all these goals. Except for the last three chances that came in the last four minutes, everything started with good defense. It could have been just a header from a goal-kick that seemlessly connected possession upfield with possession at the back, and it often was. That is nothing to underestimate, however. It was all the defense needed to do most of the time, because once Barca had the ball, they passed it from right to left, from left to right, usuallyall the way into Malaga's box. Was Malaga fighting? Perhaps they could have fought harder, but they certainly were fighting: they just had no chance of winning. When Xavi is playing his best game all season, when Messi is combining his excellent runs with excellent passes, when the defense (+ a Busi who is really, really getting the hang of the game) does their one-necessary-action-per-few-minutes perfectly, no team in the world has a chance.

Strange, then, when Barca finds all this collective play perfectly, and all that is missing is the finish, the game-breaker has essentially no collective play, and only a finish. Or should I say cannonball. Indeed, it took my bet on first-scorer, the always over-performing Pedro Rodriguez, to finally open up the scoring, after ten or eleven great chances. Out of nowhere, Pedro puts the ball on his right foot and, from about 25 yards beyond the left side of the goal, drives it home--as simply as that. After creating a ton of chances in the expected way, Barca scores the unexpected way, from the most expected of unexpected scorers. And just like that, the game is 1-0, seemingly dead-at-last, and Pedro, the Real Special One, is one piledriver closer to the always-starting list in everyone's opinion and not just mine.

Within 15 minutes, all that brilliance seemed to come to an end, with the one mistake the defense made. It came down to overconfidence and thinking that the game was over. After Alves puts in his 1,843 poor cross of the game, Busi makes a rare defensive mistake. Sure, he is in the right place, as he was the whole game, but he tries to recapture some of that fanciness that characterized his poor play in the past by heading it to somebody who would be there, because Barca is magic. Except they are not magic. Malaga does the right thing for once with one of their few moments on the ball and brings it down our right side, which, with Alves having just made the cross, is wide-open. Xavi fills the space, but he is no defender. Pique and Puyol are, but they, in quite uncharacteristic overconfidence, miscommunicate and burst forward at the same time, each thinking that the tackle will be made, so why don't they themselves make it? Magic, right? No--the ball is passed simply in between the two, and Valdo has at least forty yards to run in on goal. Just maybe, Valdes could have done better--Pique and Puyol definitely should have.

And after 81 minutes of domination, it looked like one of the worst "one-of-those-days" anyone can think of. Except, Barca had a perfect reaction: "well, graham crackers. We have to put one away now." On the very next play, within a minute of the restart, Messi ran in from the right, beat two, passed it to Iniesta, who backheeled it back to Messi, who took the snap-shot for a good save. Within three minutes, Barca had their goal, and it was a special, special goal.

In those three minutes, Malaga did not have the ball. Not once. They came close to getting it after a Maxwell cross to Messi that was to tall for the little guy, but Pedro came bursting back to pick up the loose ball, and showed off some great skill to escape pressure. Then he passed it back, and the ball moved back to Pique, who gave it to Xavi, who gave it to Messi on the right. Messi jogged inside, and mis-placed a pass to Ibra, who mis-touched to Pedro, who was back on the left side of the box. Two-touches, Ibra continued running to the wing, and he gets it back. One-touch to Maxwell, one-touch (and a difficult one) back to Pedro. Two-touches, turn, and it's Xavi in the middle, who just takes a moment to look--three touches. Alves is running inside the box on the right. Boom, he has it, from a narrow ground pass through a gap between four players. He is unmarked, one-touch into the middle, and Messi is unmarked. Messi taps it home.

Tracking back from a forward. One touch in our third, one touch in the middle third, then the rest in and around the box. One-touch and two-touch play, with only one player--the key player with the best eyes in the world--touching it thrice. Ball-movement that puts the sport of basketball to shame. This goal had it all.

It should have been 3-1, when Bojan came on for Pedro and, in his one moment, received a perfect long-ball from Pique on the left, ran in along the touchline, and stroked in the most perfect ball you can ask for from the young'n for Ibra to tap in. But Weligton, who was a constant thorn in our side with his strength, fell over next to Ibra because he was "fouled".

I apologize for the length of this post--it will probably be my longest post for some time, but I cannot say enough about this performance. It was not a perfect game. Aside from the goal conceded and the chances missed, certain errors became prominent, such as Iniesta's consistently poor crosses, to Alves' consistently poor crosses and deteriorating distribution throughout the game. Everything else felt so distinctly not-memorable that it is hardly worth criticizing. If I was in the habit of rating players, I would give the worst player on the field an eight--maybe a nine. But I do not dare say who I thought that was, because it would be so harsh.

Next week, tune in to see Barca thrash Almeria. I cannot say if it will be such a good performance, but I also cannot say Barca will not put away six or seven goals on a poorer performance. Such is the period this team is in right now, and sometimes I feel honored to watch.

Barca 4-0 Racing Santander, or, Stepping Up

After a conspicuous loss that had the Madrid rags predicting Real's imminent dominance, Barca lit up the Camp Nou and put its mighty foot down.

Looking at the injury list ahead of this match, even the most experienced and skeptical viewer of La Liga might have believed, to an extent, the shouting Madridismo coming from the capitol about how Atletico has opened the almighty floodgates to allow Madrid's astronomically superior quality to shine through at last. After a soft hammering of a light defense against the other team in Madrid, the Racing match presented similarly unusual problems in the all-important Barca midfield. With Xavi out, surely Barca would be without its guiding rudder, and without Keita and Yaya, Racing would be able to run roughshod all over the sleek Camp Nou pitch, right?

Right?

Not this team. Some people will view this match, and see a world-class team against a side that had obviously given up before even entering their opponent's house--not me. I prefer to think that, with the raaaaaaare absence of Xavi Hernandez, the incessant nattering coming from Madrid, and the widespread doubts stemming from an ignominious defeat to a basket-case of an Atletico Madrid team, the boys put their heads together and said "heeelll naw."

It started with the brilliance of Pep Guardiola and his magesterial physical staff, that patched up Yaya in two steps of Messi's pace and rolled out a lineup that looked, well, full-strength: Valdes, Puyol, Marquez, Pique, Maxwell, Yaya, Busquets, Iniesta, Henry, Messi, Bojan. And I expected a start from Thiago or dos Santos.

Through the rest of the game, though, it was the individuals. They had no illusions what it would mean for Xavi to be out, and they also noticed that their big, expensive Swedish striker was out as a late-scratch. So it was a time to step up, for everyone. Marquez and Henry needed to prove that they're still world-class after a first half of a season that left people like me doubting. Maxwell needed to prove that we can survive a long absence for Abidal. Iniesta and Messi needed to prove that they are formidable even without Xavi. Bojan and Busquets needed to prove that they're worth a good-goddamn, and arguably both played out of position.

Guardiola said that the team was not at its best--I think they were inspired and energized enough to put four goals past a team that they should have beaten as badly as Atletico should have been. What's more, almost all of the players I have mentioned stepped up and proved exactly what they set out to prove, and some of them, emphatically so.

The game started out at a neck-breaking pace, as Barca invaded massive swaths of space in the midfield. Iniesta was Barca's fount of creativity, and set the tone by charging through the midfield on the ball and ripping great long passes that would be the trademark of his game. But it was really Marquez who stamped his name on the game first, however, as one of many wonderful, questioning balls over the defense found Racing's box. Two defenders had tracked Henry, and the ball bounced off one of their backs, and toward a lurking Iniesta. Iniesta pounced on the bouncing ball, jumping on it ninja-style to knock it into the goal with a deceptively-controlled piece of skill. At 1-0, Iniesta slid in front of the adoring Camp Nou crowd to celebrate his first goal since Chelsea 1-1 on that wonderful day.

Eight minutes gone, and two reputations have been cleared.

The game went on at the same pace, and Iniesta continued to dictate the order of things with a supreme performance. He did the simple passes and moves with "oomph", and spiced it up with the best long-passes and cross-fields, profound moments of dribbling and distributing skill, and several moments of midfield defense. Assisting him was Busquets, who created a new talking point for guys like me: is he a box-to-box midfielder instead of a defensive midfielder? With Yaya playing behind him, Busi became a totally different animal. His excellently-timed runs forward came precisely at the right moments for teammates to put a ball into the defense and ask questions, and came back to haunt Racing for 90 minutes. Wonderful positioning found him cutting out tons of wayward passes and touches in the midfield. His passes took on a whole new meaning, and in a few majestic moments, his play with the team took on a centrality that reminded me of where Xavi runs, what Xavi does. Frankly, it took all the dumb-looking, too-fancy moments of his play in the defensive role and threw them in a whole new light.

Indeed, moments in which Sergio Busquets was the central figure led to two fouls that became two free-kick goals. In the first, Busquets found the ball in the midfield, with a too-far-up defender right on him. He simply turned, and started to lumber toward the goal. Though he was tackled quickly, Messi was right there to sweep up and terrorize the scrambling defense. After causing some alarm, he laid it back to Iniesta, who of course caused more alarm. But he just laid it back to Yaya, who made a great little pass to none other than Busi, who ran right to the perfect place. All he does is one-touch it to Iniesta, whose touch is perfect, and he bursts through, only to lose the ball which lands...at Busi's feet. Now, Racing's defense is falling to pieces, and as Bojan takes the diagonal run inside, it's beginning to look like a brilliant Barca goal. But, it isn't to be: Busi puts a most-excellent touch past one defender, but succumbs to a foul.

But no problem. The much-maligned Thierry Henry, the one that never takes free kicks for Barca for I-don't-know-why, stepped up and side-footed it through the wall into the near-side, and Racing was finished within half-an-hour.

But still, the team carried on, to prove a point: We are the best team in the world, and certainly, Real Madrid is not. Only a few minutes later, Busi had his other moment of greatness. An awful clearance finds him in the box, with his back to goal and everyone surrounding him. He simply looks up thinking, "Where's Mr. Reliable," and pops a lofted ball to the feet of Iniesta that would be worthy of the man himself. Iniesta controls without a problem, and pops the ball up to a Racing player's hand. In a similar situation to the last set-piece, Marquez steps up and puts in an even better free-kick. 3-0, Racing is really finished, Marquez has a goal and an assist, Iniesta is part of all three goals, and Busi is central to two. Point proven, no?

The game turned into a practice session, where everyone had a chance to work on their chops. Bojan took the opportunity to express himself. Taking advantage of some defeated defenders with a number of fabulous, sprightly runs through defenses, he had an above-average game by his standards. My favorite moment was when he found a loose ball deep on the left, and, having spied Iniesta running against the sideline, attempted a cheeky flick with the outside of his right. Though it did not work, he picked it up, a la Messi, and went off to the races, with three players floundering in his wake, only to pass it to Messi to calm down play with Iniesta further up the field. He put in a few dangerous-looking crosses, as well.

But the man of the match was Iniesta, who really ruled the game and showed that he truly did not need Xavi to run the Barcelona engine. From juking every defender on the field, to finding himself always, always open, to placing dangerous balls beyond it, to drawing a foul every single time Racing had a hope of finally getting the ball off of him, Iniesta overshadowed everybody.

Even Messi had precious few opportunities to prove that he does not need Xavi (or Iniesta). Perhaps his knee really was bothering him, because there was not much to remember of his play, except for the goal he assisted. But that goal was all Thiago Alcantara's, who had come on for Yaya in the 76th minute. Within ten minutes, this young boy put himself on the scoresheet and, in the spirit of the game, proved that he will one day be a valuable part of this team. With great off-the-ball movement that he showcased often in his brief time on the field, he found the ball just outside the box, and lofted an inch-perfect pass to a running Messi. Messi does what he should always do perfectly, controlled, froze his man, cut the ball back, and gave it back to Thiago, who did well to find himself space. He controlled, hesitated, and blasted it in for a goal that made me smile for the rest of the day. It was a shame that Messi did not celebrate with a player that he may play with on a regular basis in the future, but he knew that it was not his day when it really should have been.

It should have been everyone's day against such underwhelming opposition, but it unfortunately was not, and that is exactly what Pep was talking about when he said the team was not at its best. Pique mixed good defense and passing with bad defense and passing in a very inconsistent game. Maxwell did well to show off some great footwork occasionally and defended well in general, but still looks too unaggressive, especially in the air, to show anyone why he should start ahead of Abidal. Yaya began the game playing like his immense, bear-man self, applying pressure in all the right places, displaying great passes and superb intelligence on the ball, but showed his rust as the game wore on with some uncharacteristically loose possession and passing (to his credit though, when he lost the ball, he often ran after his tackler like a bull and won it back). Speaking of rust, Henry's game was characterized by the squeaking of rusty touches, passes, and shots that tragically overbalanced the handful of brilliant, experienced moments in his game. Puyol did generally well, popping in with a number of tackles that seemingly came out of nowhere, but is clearly never going to be the attacking force we expect of a starting fullback. And Valdes, well, he had literally nothing to do--but his passes between Marquez and Pique caused not a few anxious moments that become increasingly worrying as one sees them under increasing pressure, game after game. Pedro and Jeffren also came on for Henry and Puyol, respectively, but they did little more than look young and energetic and, in Jeffren's case, like a winger rather than a fullback.

And so, Guardiola has a few of the finer points to work out with his team. But how many teams can play with only three or four players playing particularly well, still bang in four goals, and keep a clean sheet? Next is Stuttgart at their house, and we will probably play without Xavi, but the way this team is, and how Iniesta plays, I say: bring on the Champion's League, and let's get to doing the double.

Atletico 2-1 Barca, or, Inauspicious Circumstances

With two soft goals conceded, Barca loses its undefeated league season. May I be the first to propose that we retire the yellow shirts vs. Atletico? Last year's 4-3 loss in the same fixture, with the same shirts, had a very similar tenor--lots of good play, some good chances missed, nullified by some really poor play.

Perhaps the game was lost when the starting XI was announced--Valdes, Jeffren, Puyol, Milito, Maxwell, Busquets, Keita, Xavi, Messi, Ibrahimovic, Iniesta. I was quite excited, actually, as it was an opportunity for readers to see the testing of my Keita/Busquets double-pivot hypothesis. Alas, a very early injury to Keita put the kibosh on that, and forced Barca into a conventional and, maybe, more predictable formation. With the few early moments of pressure Busquets and Keita were putting on Atletico in tandem, the outlook was for a very interesting match discussion--but it was not to be.

Of course, that was not the crucial fact about the lineup, because the newly-signed and newly-numbered Jeffren Suarez came in at right fullback--and why? There were certainly rumors about this particular RB selection, with Jeffren's previous 45-minute outing vs. lowly Cultural Leonesa earlier in the season, but I was nonetheless baffled by this choice. After seeing a second- (third-?) division left-winger take Jeffren apart in that match-up, I thought Puyol would be the most logical choice, with either Muniesa or Fontas, both popular critically, coming in to patch things up in the middle. Even the fact that Marc Bartra was a natural RB, though I had never heard of him, made it sound like he would be a better choice. Combine this poor selection with the rather like-and-like pairing of Milito and Puyol, and we have a pretty vulnerable-looking defense. I still cannot quite figure this one out, unless I accept that Guardiola, just maybe, wanted to show off the young boy he chose to renew out of four very promising candidates in the cantera--and that, my friends, is poor management, something Pep Guardiola very seldom engages in.

A few early tackles from the young Venezuelan made for the most deceptive start to the game possible, because for the roughly an hour he spent on the pitch, Atletico tore him to shreds. Sure, there were some clearly-missed tackles, but it became clear that Atletico were allowed to simply victimize him by putting the winger and fullback, and sometimes also Forlan, to work in his area, which just made it unfair for somebody who, though aggressive, clearly has not been to a clinic on positioning. Playing from deep, he was constantly harassed on the ball, and limited to hopeful balls over the defense on offense. The game was completely bereft of overlapping runs on his side, which brought Messi much closer to the right sideline for most of the game. And what happens when Messi spends most of his time there? He turns into number-10-superhero, runs more, passes less, jukes more defenders, but ultimately loses the ball again and again. Though he was not directly responsible for any goal, Jeffren reduced the possession game significantly and put a ton of pressure on the likes of Puyol and Milito. And that is Pep Guardiola's fault.

That said, Barca really could have won this game, as a few fantastic individual displays in the first half gave me several reasons to hope. Pedro, on for Keita, looked very lively, with a barrel of confidence, growing positional discipline, pace, aggression, and some very decent crosses to boot that could have become assists. Feeding him was the best player in the world of the next three or four years, Andres Iniesta, who was simply awe-inspiring, so composed was he in everything he did. Awesome and effortless cross-field balls, especially to Pedro, his dances around defenders and through entire defenses, flawless passing, perfect timing of runs, loads of space found and created, and I-don't-know-how-many possible assists characterized an absolutely insane first-half by anyone's standards. He is clearly beginning to outshine his twin, Xavi, who came off injured (!) late in the game and played the most sub-par game in all my memory of him. What picked my head up most, however, was Ibrahimovic, who is "getting it" more and more with each game. His runs are being rewarded, he is beginning to impose his gigantic physique on defenders, his distribution is getting astronomically better, and he is finally getting the confidence to show off his consummate skill. He scored Barca's only goal, but with just slightly quicker reactions and a bit of luck, he could have had four. Last but not least, Sergio Busquets seems to also be coming into his own. Now that he is playing a simpler game with his passing and possession, he appears to have shaken off a lot of anxiety, and looks to be a much more composed and calm player, in the mold of Xabi Alonso (hopefully). His off-the-ball movement still leaves a lot to be desired--perhaps he is a bit "too" safe in his positioning as well, having learned the consequences of attempting passes and skills that are over his head--but the facts remain: he was always in the right place to tackle attackers in the middle, and his passing, though supportive and not too impressive, was 100%.

But a loss is a loss, and Barca sure deserved it. The first goal was one of the most deceptively soft goals you will ever see. Xavi makes an awful attempt at a cross-field ball--a very rare thing indeed--and Jose Antonio Reyes picks it up in his half, in the middle of the field, which is far from his preferred position to receive. But, he runs with it, right past Iniesta--who went to ground way too quickly--and right past Busquets--who simply mis-timed his tackle--before passing it through a gaping hole in the middle of the defense. Puyol makes it far too easy for Forlan to run past him, he and Milito probably could have done better to leave less space in between them, but the deed was done, and it was a fairly simple goal for a very good forward. I am not sure, even after several reviews, if Valdes got his hand to it or not, but I think it just might have been a bit save-able--still, it would be very harsh to blame him too much.

But that goal seemed to have racked his confidence significantly, because just a few minutes later, our keeper, who has done so well this season, outperforming his expectations in every single game, made an utter hash of Simao's free kick. That was a pretty simple save to make, and Valdes was in pole-position to pull it off, but at the last moment he moved out of position, only to scramble back too late and see the ball fly into the far-side--the keeper's side--of his goal.

However, Barca responded well to each of these goals. Iniesta and Pedro were the prime movers-and-shakers that nearly teed up Ibrahimovic twice between the goals conceded. Even before the goal, the team looked like scoring, as a great run and (rare) good pass from Messi, assisted by Iniesta, found Ibrahimovic, who inauspiciously fell over the ball and lost the chance. And, of course, within three minutes of going down two goals, we got one back, as a corner taken by Xavi was easily flicked on by Puyol to a completely unmarked Ibrahimovic, who sent his goal-drought back to hell with a Hammer-of-Thor strike into the roof of the net (Drogba 1-0 Arsenal, anyone?). In the end, none of it counted. Here's why:

-Poor possession. It is one thing to have a ton of possession and be unable to find the final ball or the finish, that has actually been quite common for teams like Barcelona in the past--here, Barca could create chances at will for most of the game, but did not have the overwhelming possession they are used to having. There were too many giveaways all over the field, and by the end of the game, one got the sense that Atletico had seen way, way too much of the ball. Milito was a culprit, with several long-pass attempts that, I do not think, once made it to their target. Pedro and Maxwell each had more than a few moments in which they lost the ball a bit cheaply. Messi, in doing his thang, was making a lot more poor passes than good passes, and, of course, was getting caught in possession. But mainly, it was my hero, Xavi Hernandez, Barca's engine. His off-the-ball movement in Atletico's half was definitely below his sterling standard, and with Iniesta doing that bit quite well, Xavi had very little to do with the attack, and so Iniesta was only about half as devastating as he should be. Most uncharacteristic, though, was his very poor passing, which could have been the worst on the team--very, very strange for one of the best passers in the world. His long balls and cross-field balls were all over the place. His little flicks and drags were not finding their target. He made an effective back-passer, and possessed the ball fairly well, but the few balls forward seemed ill-advised in retrospect, as that player often found himself in immediate trouble (watch again, trust me). It makes sense that he came off with an injury--a very rare injury--because by his standards, he played with one leg. Almost as if they were real twins, Xavi's ineffectiveness seemed to rub off on Iniesta, as his passing became very loose in the second half.

-Poor defense. I have harped on Jeffren enough--needless to say, he should never have been on the pitch. Puyol, though brave, can be blamed for both goals conceded, as he not only allowed Forlan to run past him for the first, but he gave away the foul that led to the second. I have cited Milito's poor passing, but most striking was a lot of seeming discomfort with a new partner on either side. Maxwell looked very adequate, but too un-aggressive at times, holding off an attacker and giving away too much space, and of course, that moment when he turned a good-looking attack into a counter-attack starting in our half, when his attempt to keep the ball in resulted in Atletico with the ball as he stood behind the play. However, the whole tracking-back scheme that makes Barca look so dominant was very inconsistent at Atletico. Perhaps Messi did not have much of a chance to track back, as the right often disintegrated fairly quickly, but the whole rest of the team (except, perhaps, for Busquets, though you could argue that he did not go forward enough to "track back") had defensive moments that were few and far-between. This only added to the discomfort of the likes of Milito. As for Valdes, well, he came down from such a height.

Because ESPN blacked out the game from about the 65th minute, I cannot say anything about Bartra, who was apparently very good, and Bojan, or the performances of all the players toward the end, so take this all with a grain of salt.

Next is Racing at home, and though we will have the suspended Pique and Marquez back, as well as one or two of the injured defenders, the injury woes--such a rare circumstance for Barcelona lately--have transmitted to the midfield. Our 90-minutes-every-single-game engine, Xavi Hernandez, will definitely miss Racing and the Champion's League first-leg vs. Stuttgart, and Keita will be out for about a month. The Racing match will certainly be a huge day for many players. Iniesta, as Xavi's heir-apparent, will be trying to prove that he can play his twin's game. As a midfield-team with a mostly-hurt midfield, our forwards will be trying to stake a claim of importance. Messi needs to prove that he's not just the superstar with all the highlights, but that he is also as important as Xavi to the team. Henry, who has not featured lately, and hopefully is not hurt (or Ronaldinho-07-08-hurt), has a chance to prove that he is still Titi Henry with a long-overdue goal or two. And for one lucky young midfielder, perhaps Thiago Alcantara or Jonathan dos Santos, this will be an opportunity to stake a claim to a contract extension and a future with FC Barcelona.

Hopefully, I will have the post up before the day of the next match. Until then...