Andrés Iniesta became one of the few Barcelona players to be truly loved by Espanyol fans with this gesture.

Before the biggest match in Andrés Iniesta’s career and in the history of Spanish football, Iniesta had a trillion thoughts running through his head.  One of those thoughts that came to fruition was writing a message to his close friend, Daniel Jarque, on his undershirt.  That message said, “Dani Jarque, siempre con nosotros,” (Dani Jarque, always with us).

Jarque, who was born and bred through the Espanyol system, had succeeded club legend Raúl Tamudo as club captain in the summer of 2009, a lifelong dream for the hometown boy from Barcelona.  During a preseason trip with Espanyol to Italy that summer, Jarque suffered a heart attack and lost his life at the tender age of 26.  The only comfort that anyone could take from Jarque’s death was that he achieved the pinnacle of club captain while still alive.

Even if Spain lost that World Cup final to the Netherlands, Iniesta would have displayed his undershirt to the 84,490 people in Soccer City and to the cameras beaming the match throughout the world, but it would have not had the same impact.  Sergio Ramos and Jesús Navas had a similar sentiment and message for their fallen teammate, Antonio Puerta, but it did not have the same impact.  Whether you believe in fate and destiny or not, who scored the 116th minute goal, the only goal in the match, to earn Spain its first World Cup?  Andrés Iniesta.  Instead of the relative anonymity that Iniesta usually enjoys, that strike put him front and center, and he had no hesitation to rip off his jersey and reveal his communiqué to the hundreds of millions of people watching Spain’s triumph in South Africa.

Fast forward five months later to the 152nd edition of El Derbi Barceloní, and both Catalan clubs are flying high in the table, one expectedly and the other unexpectedly.  Barcelona’s recent form had been nothing short of stellar, completing a combined 26-0 thrashing of their last six opponents in all competitions, including the signature performance of the season with their “La Manita” 5-0 dismissal of Real Madrid in the Camp Nou.  Espanyol, through the strength of their 100% home record, has consistently stayed in the European zone and had camped out in fourth position for the past four weeks.

Usually, Espanyol plays the role of spoiler in this derby, trying with all their might to derail FC Barcelona from winning championships because los periquitos normally have nothing for which to play in the derby except for pride; however, Saturday’s match meant more for Espanyol in terms of a potential Champions League berth for the blanc i blaus, and they came in with expectations for the first time in a while, the first time in a while that both teams are playing on a somewhat level playing field when it comes to league placement.

The Espanyol supporters released all of their pent-up venom for their more glamorous neighbors before the match, displaying “Anti-Culé” scarves, carrying props, including tombstones with the Barça badge on them and a strange and disturbing yet hilarious blonde blowup doll with Gerard Piqué’s cut-out face glued on in reference to the Piqué – Shakira rumored affair, and jeering every Barça player as the public address announcer read each name, save for one person: Andrés Iniesta.  Signs throughout the Cornellà – El Prat gave thanks to Iniesta for thinking about their former captain during the World Cup, and some even had Espanyol jerseys with Iniesta’s name emblazoned on the back with the number 21, Dani Jarque’s number.

When Pep Guardiola made the decision to substitute Iniesta in the 86th minute for Seydou Keita, Iniesta received a standing ovation from the Espanyol crowd that few, if any, Barcelona players ever received.  Even both sets of players, who still had jobs to do on the pitch even though Barça was routing Espanyol 1-5 at that point, also joined in the love fest for Iniesta, clapping him off the field in respect for his dignity and his human spirit.  True to a rivalry, however, once Iniesta came off and Keita entered, the cheers turned to whistles, and order was restored after a moment of solidarity between the two Catalan clubs.

Iniesta felt the emotion of the crowd and the transcendent nature of that moment in time:

“I felt something when I was on the pitch, and that is the greatest thing.  More important than the rivalry are the people involved.  They have sent me many messages, and that is much more important to me.”

With most of the attention on the unassuming and humble Andrés Iniesta, there actually was a game played at 20:00 CET on Saturday night, and Espanyol, with their unbounded confidence at home, tried to play football with Barcelona.  In the past few derbies, Espanyol’s tactics involved an overt physicality to knock the Barça players off the ball and away from their concerto rhythm.  Sometimes, Espanyol would partake in more than questionable challenges to prove their athletic prowess.  Not this time.

Pablo Osvaldo announced his team’s intentions with the first minute with a decent shot to the right near post, where Víctor Valdés made a comfortable save.  Espanyol would try to play out of the back and keep possession, but the still-underrated Barcelona defense pressured every Espanyol player on the ball and pinned them in their own half as Barça created chance after chance, including an inexplicable miss from Lionel Messi with an open goal in front of him.

Messi would not score in the match, a rare event these days, but that did not mean that Espanyol shut down his game because Messi provided two assists to raise his total to an astonishing ten, four ahead of Juan Mata, Mesut Özil, Xabi Prieto, and teammate Pedro Rodríguez at the top of the assists table, as well as creating the second goal for Pedro when he pinged his shot off the post.  Pedro and David Villa each had a brace, and Xavi Hernández scored from an acute angle to contribute to Barcelona’s five goals.

Only when Espanyol fell two goals behind within the opening half-hour did they revert to their old tactics, and in a span of five minutes, referee Alberto Undiano Mallenco showed three yellow cards to three different Espanyol players.  It slowed Barcelona’s attack to an extent, but it did not put a blockade on Carlos Kameni’s goal.

When Pablo Osvaldo scored in the 63rd minute, it gave Espanyol a tiny flicker of hope at 1-3.  José Callejón sent in a cutting ball through the always-high Barcelona defensive line for Osvaldo, and Carles Puyol was never going to catch the Argentinean.  Víctor Valdés, however, backed up and decided to stay on his line rather than come off his line and close the angle down on Osvaldo’s shot.  Osvaldo blasted it past Valdés to the left far post for the goal, and Puyol dressed down Valdés for being passive rather than being assertive on Osvaldo.

The next two scoring chances after Osvaldo’s goal went to Espanyol, and with a little luck, it could have easily been 2-3.  Callejón’s cross to Osvaldo was a few inches too high, as Osvaldo could not snap the header down and looped it over the crossbar.  Xavi then gave away a cheap turnover that on which Osvaldo pounced with a potential one-on-one with Valdés in sight, but Piqué and Puyol came in on either side of Osvaldo, and that forced Osvaldo to rush his shot to the right far post, and Valdés smothered it with relative ease.

Barcelona always gives their opposition a couple of moments to capitalize because they play a suicidally high defensive line, but Espanyol did not convert, and Barça scored twice in the final fifteen minutes to add a gloss that was not indicative of the match played at the Cornellà – El Prat.

1-5 fulltime, but Barcelona was not four goals better than Espanyol.

Just three.

Espanyol had given up only two goals in seven matches at home prior to the derby, and while they conceded five, they did not play poorly at all.  Such is the current brilliance of Barcelona.  With Valencia’s win at Real Sociedad later that night, Espanyol fell to fifth even though Valencia tied them on points because of goal difference.  Valencia and Espanyol will meet at the beginning of the new year to break the deadlock, and even if Espanyol does not win against Valencia at the Mestalla, the blanc i blau should maintain their place in the European places throughout the season because of their tremendous home form and the ebullient attacking trio of Luís García, José Callejón, and Pablo Osvaldo with Joan Verdú acting as the orchestrator of the bunch.

For Barcelona, their level of play has been so high that the pundits and the scribes have almost described a 1-5 romp against their derby rivals as “routine”, and they should not make that mistake.  The blaugrana cannot possibly keep up this form for the rest of the season (or can they?), so these types of performances should not be dismissed so easily as a typical Barça blowout.

Despite the destruction caused by this historic Barcelona team, they have not won any trophies yet this campaign, and the players would be the first ones to point out this fact.  A La Liga/Champions League double has become the minimum expectation for this season’s Barcelona squad, and while the bookies have them as heavy favorites to win both competitions, silverware is not won in December.

Inter Milan might have won the FIFA Club World Cup on Saturday to lay claim to the official title of the world’s best club team, but hardly anyone can argue who is currently the best club team based on the eye test.

FC Barcelona.

Fueras de Juego

- Referee Carlos Clos Gómez made himself the center of attention as he handed out eleven yellow cards and two red cards in Real Madrid’s scrappy 1-0 over Sevilla on Sunday night.  Holding up the match report in the post-match press conference, José Mourinho claimed that Clos Gómez made thirteen “very serious mistakes” but would not go into detail in fear of another suspension.  Despite the horrendous refereeing performance, many of the bad calls going against Real Madrid, los blancos squeaked out a tight victory over a desperate Sevilla side that needed three points in the worst way possible.  In any championship-winning season, a team plays a few matches in which they were outplayed or did not deserve to win, yet somehow sneak away with the full three points.  This match against Sevilla was exactly that type of match, and Real Madrid kept themselves from falling five points behind Barcelona, which at this point could be impossible to overcome.  Karim Benzema provided another tepid performance, and the need for another striker in January could not be more blatantly seen than in Madrid’s match against Sevilla.

- The most entertaining match of the weekend took place at the Estadio de los Juegos Mediterráneos, where Almería went up two goals on Getafe within the first half-hour, but Getafe scored three unanswered goals to nick the victory 2-3.  This match was one of the fastest-paced in La Liga this season, and there were few occasions where either team could take a breath, as the other would immediately break toward the opposition goal.  Almería’s loss to Getafe was a backbreaker because, even at this early stage, they could look at those three dropped points as one of the reasons why they could eventually suffer relegation.  José Luís Oltra has given Almería an extra boost, and if he keeps Kalu Uche ahead of Henok Goitom as the center forward, Almería should avoid relegation by the slimmest of margins.

- At the opposite side of the spectrum, Osasuna and Real Zaragoza played one of the dourest matches of the season, as Osasuna created virtually all of the scoring chances in the match against an absent Real Zaragoza team yet could not score.  Both teams have already been eliminated from the Copa del Rey, so they will not play in the midweek, and both teams looked as though they started their winter break when Antonio Mateu Lahoz blew his whistle for the opening kickoff.  Unless Zaragoza can reloan Humberto “Chupete” Suazo from Monterrey, Zaragoza will go down for the second time in four years.

Josep Guardiola, known for his cool demeanor inside and outside of the technical area, channeled his feelings for all things Madrid when he refused to give Cristiano Ronaldo the ball for a throw-in on the half-hour mark.  Unlike his outspoken and demonstrative counterpart José Mourinho, Guardiola usually keeps to himself, shouting and dictating to his players on the pitch on rare occasions.  Monday night’s match was El Clásico, however, and normal circumstances and situations have little bearing.  The ball had gone out of play, and Ronaldo wanted to take a throw-in quickly to continue what little momentum Real Madrid had going forward.  The ball fortuitously came to Guardiola, and in one of his less sporting moments, he held the ball away from Ronaldo and then eventually rolled it away from him.  Ronaldo took exception to such behavior and shoved him in the chest, starting a little fracas as the Barça players came to defend Guardiola while the Real players took Ronaldo’s side.

Mentioning how normal circumstances fly out of the window during El Clásico, Víctor Valdés, Gerard Piqué, and Carles Puyol would be the ones who would immediately soar into the affray because of their combative personalities, and on cue, Valdés received a yellow card for coming out of his penalty area to confront Ronaldo.  Who was the first one, however, to challenge Ronaldo for his behavior?  The mild-mannered and unassuming Andrés Iniesta.  Iniesta was the nearest Barça player to the situation, but Dani Alves, Lionel Messi, and Sergio Busquets were also around, saw exactly what Ronaldo did to Guardiola, and did not immediately react as Iniesta did.

By the time the Guardiola – Ronaldo showdown occurred, it was already 2-0 in favor of the Catalans, and that situation was the only fight that Real Madrid could muster throughout the whole of the match.

Before the match, Mourinho had to make one forced change to his settled starting eleven, as Gonzalo Higuaín failed to pass a late fitness test due to a back muscle injury, and the much-maligned Karim Benzema deputized for Higuaín as the lone center-forward.  Benzema had become 75th – 80th minute replacement for Higuaín in most of the matches this season, and he had provided some decent performances in those short stints.  He needed to fill Higuaín’s boots from the start of the match against their toughest and most important opponent, however, and Benzema’s few starts for Real Madrid this season were nothing about which to write.

Guardiola sent out his optimum eleven, which meant that the slightly more defensive Éric Abidal started at left back over the Brazilian Maxwell.  With Ángel di María and Cristiano Ronaldo on the flanks and willing to switch at any moment, Guardiola wanted the defensive assurances of Abidal to cover the Barça left wing.

From the opening minutes, this version of El Clásico did not resemble the tight, cagey matches from the previous season where both teams found it hard to penetrate the opposition’s defensive lines.  At least for FC Barcelona.

Lionel Messi, who had never scored against a José Mourinho-trained club, provided the ominous, early salvo in the sixth minute.  From the right edge of the penalty area, Messi audaciously chipped a ball to the left far post over Iker Casillas and pinged off the post for a momentary let-off for Real Madrid.  Gerard Piqué was making a late run to that left back post, but Messi’s universal skills could only mean that he intentionally went for the shot over Casillas rather than crossing for Piqué that happened to beat Casillas and clang the post.

Four minutes later, Barcelona would breakthrough with the opening goal by a combination between the two best midfielders in football, Andrés Iniesta and Xavi Hernández.  After another twenty to thirty pass move, Iniesta cut in from the left and drove a pass through the Real defense, and Marcelo, desperately sliding to intercept the pass, could only deflect it to Xavi, who had made a relatively rare darting run into the box, and with his feathery touch, volleyed it over Casillas with the side of his right boot to open the floodgates.

Barcelona would score again eight minutes later when Xavi returned to his maestro role in the midfield and gave David Villa a perfectly flighted forty-yard diagonal ball to the left wing.  Villa was the only debutant in Barcelona’s starting eleven to El Clásico, and he showed no signs of nerves as he cut into the box against Sergio Ramos and got the best of both Ramos and Casillas as his squared ball across the six-yard box avoided Ramos’ lunging tackle and crept under Casillas’ gloves to an open Pedro “Don’t call me Pedrito anymore” Rodríguez, and with an empty net in front of him, Pedro knocked it in from two yards out to extend the lead to two goal before twenty minutes had ticked off the clock.

The only legitimate shout for a potential goal for Real Madrid came in the 39th minute when Ronaldo and Valdés came together in the penalty area, and referee Eduardo Iturralde González ruled that Valdés just got a finger on the ball before Ronaldo got to it and thus it was a fair challenge.  The replay proved inconclusive as it looked as though both arrived at the ball at the exact same time.

MARCA, of course, disputed Iturralde González’s decision, and for MARCA‘s more “detailed” analysis of Iturralde González’s performance, click here.  If you cannot read Spanish or do not have a website translator, MARCA did do a decent job of somewhat maintaining neutrality, but they did mark the penalty shout as a “clear penalty” as well as emphasizing Messi’s yellow card just before the break for simulation following Ricardo Carvalho’s supposedly accidental shoulder to Messi’s face.

José Mourinho did make a halftime change in the hope of turning the match around, but curiously, he took off an admittedly ineffective Mesut Özil for the midfield destroyer Lassana Diarra.  Real’s defense did not improve, and within the first fifteen minutes of the second half, Barcelona doubled their lead to an astonishing 4-0.

Lionel Messi took the role from Xavi as the midfield general as he provided two assists for David Villa that both Iniesta and Xavi would gush over.  Villa’s first goal, Barcelona’s third goal, came about through a “simple” through ball in between two Real defenders, but the foresight Messi needed to visualize the pass was impeccable, and although Villa looked to be a quarter of a body length offside, the linesman did not raise his flag, and the rout ensued.

Villa’s second goal, Barcelona’s fourth goal, was all about Messi, as he delivered the best pass of the 600/700 that Barcelona executed in the match.  Xavi started the move by causing the turnover on Lassana Diarra in midfield, and Diarra cynically pulled Xavi back to prevent the counter-attack, but Barça maintained possession, and Iturralde González correctly played the advantage when most referees would have blown the whistle.  Messi then dribbled for a few yards when he saw Villa make a run down the left wing.  He executed a pinpoint thirty to forty yard diagonal pass on the ground through four Real players for Villa in stride, and Villa took the shot first-time with his right foot, in between the legs of an onrushing Casillas, into the back of the net for an improbably 4-0 lead.

Jeffrén Suárez would add a fifth at the end of the match to complete the humiliation, but the action did not end there.

Sergio Ramos was ready to take no prisoners.

Sergio Ramos decided upon himself to avenge his fallen teammates by scything through Lionel Messi’s left leg, then pushing Carles Puyol down by his face once referee Eduardo Iturralde González had flashed the red card at him, then tweaking Xavi’s chin as he left the pitch and into the tunnel.  In a match sprinkled with bouts of unsportsmanlike conduct, Ramos took that conduct to the highest (or lowest, depending on perspective) level with his one-man Rambo-like rampage in an act of petulance that should land him at least a three-match ban if not more.

Despite this 5-0 romp and the added satisfaction of embarrassing their eternal rivals, this match only counts for three points, and in the cold light of statistics, Barcelona only has a two-point lead over Real Madrid and a seven-point lead over Villarreal.  Guardiola and his players all spoke about how this result did not mean anything if they end up losing the championship, and they somewhat quelled the euphoria of the win with their levelheaded statements in the post-match press conferences.

A humbled José Mourinho gave all the credit to Barcelona and stated that it would be easy to move on from this match because they were outplayed in all aspects of the match, and no outside influences (refereeing decisions, close calls, etc.) would have made the difference in this edition of El Clásico.  He also mentioned that because they were blown out, the loss was easier to swallow rather than a close loss.  Of course, Mourinho would try to add a positive spin to an otherwise dire performance, but the gulf in class on this particular night should alarm Mourinho.  Even if a one-goal loss would have been harder to take, at least they would know that a small adjustment here or there could have made the difference among a loss, draw, or even a win, but a five-goal blowout only indicates that Mourinho still has plenty of work to compete with FC Barcelona if they are to capture La Liga for the first time since the 2007-08 season, a barren spell for los blancos.

Josep Guardiola and FC Barcelona vividly showed how the game of football could be so simple yet equally spectacular at the same time.  While it only meant three more points in their coffer, the confidence they can take from this stellar performance can carry them into the dregs of midseason and the long, winter months.

Xavi, Jorge Valdano, and others felt that this match should not have been played on Monday because it would lose its soul, but it gave everyone in Spain as well as around the world the chance to focus solely on these two teams, and the only conclusion that the viewers of the match can make is that FC Barcelona is truly the best team in world football.

Eduardo Iturralde González (!) will officiate El Clásico on Monday night.

The José Mourinho – Pep Guardiola headline and the Lionel Messi – Cristiano Ronaldo headline have been covered and written many times over, so this preview of El Clásico will try to avoid these subjects and focus on the other, less talked about aspects of the biggest game in Spanish football this season.

The man in the middle of the fray will be Eduardo Iturralde González, the dentist from Bilbao, who will referee his third Clásico and his second at the Camp Nou.  Those who watch Spanish football on a regular basis know Iturralde’s penchant for handing out multiple cards not necessarily because they were warranted but because of his overt need to control the match.  For visual proof, watch Iturralde González give Nikola Zigic a yellow card here in one of the longest booking sessions in the history of football.

Normally, the referees that are given this match are the most highly rated in Spain, as indicated by the last the ten Clásicos being overseen by only three referees: Manuel Mejuto González, Alberto Undiano Mallenco, and Luís Medina Cantalejo.  Mejuto González retired in the summer and Medina Cantalejo the summer before, so while Undiano Mallenco will most likely take charge of the Clásico in the Santiago Bernabéu in April, someone else had to take charge of the other Clásico.

If there were any refereeing new blood to throw into the Clásico fire, it would have been Carlos Velasco Carballo, who refereed his first matches in the UEFA Champions League group stage this season and has been praised by UEFA and the RFEF for his refereeing competency, but Eduardo Iturralde González got the call because of his experience refereeing this match.

Madridistas have long cried that Iturralde González harbored pro-Barça sympathies, and while these claims have little to no substance, they show the still-fractious regionalism that continues to exist in this somewhat more unified Spain as well as the almost life-or-death meaning of El Clásico with both the Merengues and the Culés.

Now to the players.  While Barcelona will have to devise more than a couple of strategies to limit Cristiano Ronaldo and Gonzalo Higuaín’s contributions, Sergio Busquets and the central defensive pairing of Carles Puyol and Gerard Piqué will deal with the two new additions to the attacking midfield, Ángel di María and Mesut Özil, and their abilities to create for Real’s scoring duo and to outpace the relatively slow defensive four, save for Dani Alves.  Kaká, Rafael van der Vaart, Marcelo and Guti roamed the same areas last season that di María and Özil currently occupy, and they could not force or guile their way through Barça’s underrated defensive shield.

While Ángel di María and Cristiano Ronaldo switch wings from time to time, di María usually bombs down the left wing, which means he will come against Dani Alves for most of the match.  This battle will be vital for their respective clubs because if di María can continually threaten Barcelona’s final third, that means that Alves has to be more of a stay-at-home fullback, and his important contributions to Barça’s attack will be limited.  If di María is ineffective, Alves will have the freedom to act as the right wingback that suits his abilities best, and he will create space for Messi, David Villa, Xavi Hernández, Andrés Iniesta, etc. to retain possession and pry Spain’s best defense more often.

Mesut Özil has made the normally demanding Madridistas almost forget about the second most expensive transfer in football history, €65 million and currently injured Kaká.  Kaká was the central focus of the imperious attack at AC Milan, and when he brought his talents to the Santiago Bernabéu, little did he know that Florentino Pérez would sign Cristiano Ronaldo two days later to the largest transfer fee ever at €94 million.  Kaká never really fit in to Manuel Pellegrini’s system, and injuries hampered Kaká from ever fully integrating into the Real starting eleven.

With successful surgery on his left knee this past summer, Real faced four to six months without him, so new trainer José Mourinho was instrumental in signing Mesut Özil from Werder Bremen for a bargain price of €15 million, and after a couple of matches to get himself situated to his new surroundings and responsibilities, Özil has been just as important as Ronaldo and Higuaín for Real’s offensive output.

Özil is tied for the league lead with five assists as well as chipping in with three goals, but the statistics do not really tell all that Özil does for Real Madrid.  In hockey, assists are awarded not only to the player that passed to the person that scored but also to the player that passed to the principal assist man.  If football kept such statistics, Özil would likely lead the league with a double-digit assist count because he provides the link from Xabi Alonso deep in the midfield to di María, Ronaldo, and Higuaín up front, and Kaká will find it difficult to supplant the German international when he is fully fit from his knee surgery.

Sergio Busquets will have the responsibility to break up and disrupt Özil in the middle of the pitch, especially during counter-attacks.  Limiting Özil and di María to the periphery of the action should become Barcelona’s number one priority because accomplishing this task will isolate Ronaldo and Higuaín, and when they get frustrated, they both try to carry the whole team on their backs and will take ill-advised and speculative shots from all over the final third, which would suit Barcelona perfectly.

Xavi, Iniesta, Messi, Villa, and Pedro Rodríguez will do what they do in Real’s final third.  Ronaldo, Higuaín, and Xabi Alonso will do what they do in Barça’s final third.  The wild cards are the two new participants in Los Blanco’s attacking midfield, Mesut Özil and Ángel di María, and their performances on Monday night will tilt the scales in one team’s favor.  Perform well, and Real Madrid might just stop Barcelona’s four-match winning streak against Real.  Perform mediocre or poorly, and Real Madrid will suffer the ignominy of Barça’s first ever five-match winning streak against Real.

Note: The times listed below are in Eastern Standard Time (EST).

Nov. 29

Fuera de Juego: Especial El Clásico - 2:00 PM on ESPN Deportes

Gol TV Live Preview Show – 2:30 PM on Gol TV HD

FC Barcelona vs. Real Madrid – 2:50 PM on Gol TV HD (Play-by-play Phil Schoen and Analyst Ray Hudson in English with Play-by-play Diego Pessolano and Analyst Eduardo Biscayart in Spanish)

ESPN Deportes (Play-by-play Fernando Palomo and Analyst Mario Kempes)

ESPN3 (Play-by-play Adrian Healey and Analyst Robbie Mustoe in English with Play-by-play Fernando Palomo and Analyst Mario Kempes in Spanish)

FC Barcelona vs. Real Madrid Replays – 5:00 PM on Gol TV HD and 6:00 PM on ESPN Deportes

Sportscenter Especial El Clásico – 5:00 PM on ESPN Deportes

Gol TV News: El Clásico Special – 7:00 PM on Gol TV HD

La Liga 360: El Clásico – 7:30 PM on Gol TV HD

Lionel Messi is without doubt one of the best players in the world if not the most talented at the moment. Messi has been in scintillating form the last couple of years having scored 38 goals in 51 appearances in all competitions in the 2008/09 season. He also had 18 assists in those 51 matches while he managed 23 goals in 31 La Liga matches.

Messi did even better in 2009/10 season scoring 47 goals and assisting on 14 others in 53 matches in all competitions. The Argentina star had a remarkably tally of 34 goals in 35 La Liga matches. In the current campaign, Messi has already scored 13 goals in just 10 matches and his stunning tally is only inferior to Real Madrid’s Cristiano Ronaldo who scored 14 goals so far in the Spanish league. However, Ronaldo played in two more games in the league and his total number of goals in all contests is inferior to that of Messi. The Argentina forward scored 23 goals in just 18 games this season compared to Ronaldo’s 18 goals in 19 matches.

There is not doubt all eyes will be on the dangerous duo and some have gone as far as billing the clash as a ‘Messi versus Ronaldo’ contest but this is quite inaccurate as the two stars will not be facing each other on the field due to their attacking nature. This means Messi will not be responsible for marking Ronaldo and vice versa. Both teams have other key players who can influence the match such as Xavi in case of Barca and Gonzalo Higuain for Real Madrid.

Prior to this highly anticipated match against Los Blancos, Messi scored a hat-trick against Almeria last weekend and followed up his heroics with a goal in the Champions League in mid-week in Athens against Panathinaikos. There is no doubt Messi has been an absolute magician for Barcelona in the last few season and his club record backs up the fact he is perhaps the best club player on the planet. Messi scored a hat-trick against Real Madrid in El Clasico in the 2006-07 season to prove he can shine on the big occasion as well.

Some have questioned his form for Argentina but he managed to score in the 4-1 win over the World Cup champions Spain in September. However, he went one better by scoring a late winner against Brazil on November 18 in a friendly in Qatar. This is Messi’s first win over the Selecao and for him to secure the win with a sublime finish can only do wonders to his confidence. This winner for Argentina could be the goal Messi has been missing not just to take his international career to the next level but also to continue his stunning and torrid scoring record with Barca.

The main question will be whether Messi will be able to score against Los Blancos in El Clasico to add to his impressive resume. (Please check http://www.laligatalk.com/messi-versus-ronaldo/1881 for a previous piece written on Messi & Ronaldo)

Barcelona's second goal, scored by Lionel Messi, typified the creativity displayed throughout the match by both Barcelona and Villarreal.

A select few matches each season define the league in terms of pecking order and/or overall footballing ability.  Obviously, the two editions of El Clásico between Real Madrid and Barcelona usually determine the fate of La Liga’s crown.  More specifically, in the past five seasons, the team that won the most points in El Clásico has gone on to win the league.  There are thirty-six other matches, however, that both teams have to play that shape their seasons, and Barcelona hosting Villarreal on Saturday night was touted as that type of monumental match.

After Valencia has fallen by the way side from the top of the league after the October international break with one point out of a possible twelve, including an emotionally crushing 2-1 loss to Barcelona, the only team remaining that had any realistic chance of staying with the established duopoly was Villarreal.

The Yellow Submarine’s revival to their passing, flowing style under Juan Carlos Garrido coincided with positive results in the second half of last season and the third-place position they held coming into the Camp Nou on Saturday.  Giuseppe Rossi and Nilmar are developing a telepathic understanding with each other, Santi Cazorla has provided the creative influence in whatever position of the midfield he plays, and new addition Borja Valero allows Cazorla, Rossi, and Nilmar to roam if they want to with his steadying influence and ability to spray the ball around the park.

The knock with Villarreal falls on their mediocre away form.  While they have achieved a perfect eight-for-eight at home in all competitions, including a 5-0-0 record in La Liga, Villarreal has only won two matches out of eight in all competitions away from El Madrigal, including a pedestrian 2-2-1 record in La Liga, a draw at lowly Segunda División B (third tier) side Polideportivo Ejido in the Copa del Rey, and losses in the UEFA Europa League at Dinamo Zagreb and PAOK, hardly considered as European powers.

While an average away form alongside their stellar home record will likely equal a top-four place and a spot in next year’s UEFA Champions League, it simply will not equal a top-two position, much less a league championship.

A win at the Camp Nou would not only jump Villarreal above Barcelona and temporarily tied with Real Madrid on top of the table, but it would send a significant message to Real and Barça that Villarreal is not merely a nice team that they would dismiss as a little engine that could but a legitimate threat to their increasingly cozy existence standing on top of Spanish football.

If Villarreal needed more confirmation that they could at least pull out a draw in Barcelona, they ride a three-match unbeaten streak at the Camp Nou, and both of Barça’s non-wins in La Liga have occurred at home.

Both teams predicate their games on ball possession and controlling how the match will play out.  No matter how much Villarreal wants to keep the ball away from Barcelona, Barcelona will have at least 62% of possession or higher, so a sharpened and biting counter-attack is necessary if they wanted to pierce Barcelona in its side.

In the first twenty minutes of the match, Villarreal executed this strategy well with two separate counter-attacks that severely threatened Víctor Valdés’ goal.  Barcelona’s defensive line played so high that they were near midfield when they had possession, so when Villarreal recuperated the ball, it did not take a brilliant pass to get behind the defense.  Combined with a general lack of pace from the Barcelona defensive four, Giuseppe Rossi flew down the left wing to latch onto through balls in open space.  To Barça’s credit, they recovered to quell the trouble both times, but Villarreal quickly identified how they were going to hurt Barcelona, and after David Villa scored the opening goal in the 22nd minute, Villarreal responded four minutes later with a Nilmar equalizer.

Nilmar’s ankle-breaking, sublime run through four or five Barça players and subsequent shot across the face of goal and past Valdés where it pinged off the right far post and into the net came as a result of Villarreal immediately attacking a forlorn Barça team after they were denied a second goal by the linesman’s offside flag.  Just as Rossi caught the back four off-guard with his two runs behind them in the early stages of the match, Nilmar took advantage of a team that still had its mind on the shockingly erroneous offside call by the linesman, and in a flash, a 2-0 game became 1-1.

As Carlos Delgado Ferreiro blew his whistle for halftime, Villarreal could go into the dressing room with a fairly satisfied disposition because they fashioned five scoring opportunities to Barça’s three despite only possessing the ball 36% of the time.  For the Barcelona players and the Culés in the stands, they beamed their frustrations straight at Delgado Ferreiro and his crew because of their poor performance in the opening forty-five minutes, denying a two-on-one situation with Lionel Messi and Pedro Rodríguez that resulted in a goal along with other questionable calls that had the Barça supporters waving their white handkerchiefs in disgust.

When both sets of teams came out for the second half, Pep Guardiola brilliantly channeled his players’ anger at the referee into a productive yet effulgent display of football in the second half to see away their worthy adversaries, similar to Barcelona’s second-half performance against Valencia to terminate another pretender to the throne.  Guardiola had his defense play a more conservative defensive line so that Villarreal could not run into open space like they did in the first half, and while Barcelona’s definition of “conservative” means holding their line at the edge of the center circle rather than at the halfway line, they effectively suppressed the Villarreal counter-attacking game with this tweak in defense.

This modification meant that Villarreal would have to create a build-up of passing football to penetrate the penalty area, a strategy with which Villarreal is highly capable, but Barcelona would not allow them to accomplish such a proposition because they kept the ball even better than they did in the first half.  Even though the statistics show that Barcelona “only” had 68% of the possession in the second half, that percentage went down after Barcelona scored their third goal and sent in substitutes Adriano Correia and Javier Mascherano to finish off the match.

The other changes with Barcelona in the second half had nothing to do with tactics and everything to do with the luminosity, the splendor, and every other positive adjective to describe Lionel Messi.  In perfect, synchronized amalgamation with Pedro, Barcelona’s second goal to regain the lead must go down as the goal of the season, and rather than wasting words on describing what happened, click on this to witness a universe-class event of understanding and trust between two players.

Messi would pounce on Joan Capdevila’s block of Pedro’s shot in the closing stages of the match to seal the victory for Barcelona at 3-1, showing the predatory, goal-poaching instincts in the penalty area that go understated with all of his other outstanding traits.

Villarreal played really well while the box score would say otherwise, and on many other days, including against Barcelona or Real Madrid, Villarreal would have at least garnered a point in the worst-case scenario.  Unfortunately, for El Amarillo Submarino, this night was not many other nights.

The critics and the cynics will jump on this match and proclaim that La Liga is morphing into a more glamorous version of the Scottish Premier League because second-place Barcelona now has a five-point gap over third-place Villarreal with leaders Real Madrid six points clear.  Villarreal, who was supposedly a danger to the Spanish royalty, could not compete with Barcelona in the second half as Barça deservedly won a 3-1 decision at home.

Maybe there is a kernel of truth behind that argument, but the same pundits who proclaim the Barclays Premier League as the most competitive league in the world because the “Big Four” could lose in any one matchday overlook the fact that only once in the past five years had a club other than Chelsea or Manchester United finished in the top two (Liverpool finished second in the 2008/09 season), the same amount of times it has happened in La Liga when Barcelona and Real Madrid did not end as the top two teams in La Liga (Villarreal finished second in the 2007/08 season).

That is a debate and discussion for another day.  The focus should sit squarely on Barcelona and its combination of individual and team performances that led to a two-goal victory over a Villarreal team that deserves it place as the third-best team in Spain at this moment.  If Barcelona can carry this form over to El Clásico two weeks from now on Monday night football (!?!?), this upcoming edition of the derby will be the most intriguing Clásico since… the last edition of El Clásico.

Fueras de Juego

- No one exerted less pressure on the opposition for an entire half that Real Zaragoza did in the first half against Sevilla on Sunday.  With Zaragoza playing at a snail’s pace with five in the back along with a holding midfielder, Sevilla could have stood still for the entire half and Zaragoza would not have scored.  Zaragoza trainer José Aurelio Gay made two changes and a formation shift to start the second half, and the whistles that deservedly rained down on Zaragoza turned into cheers and encouragement as Nico Bertolo got the equalizer and Sevilla left back Fernando Navarro was sent off halfway through the second period.  A late winner from Álvaro Negredo, of all people, broke los maños hearts, and Sevilla escaped with a 1-2 victory at La Romareda.

César Muñiz Fernández created another controversy when he clearly appeared to flash the yellow card at Alexis for dissent, which would have been his second, but the yellow was eventually credited to Frédéric Kanouté.  Muñiz Fernández is quickly becoming the second coming of Alfonso Pérez Burrull for his puzzling decisions and his general arrogance that only helps to rile up the players.

- Frightening scenes preceded the second half between Hércules and Real Sociedad as an Hércules youth player or employee lay motionless on the ground with the emergency workers quickly coming to his aid to diagnose the problem.  As of the time of this writing, there is no update on the situation, but with the recent passings of Antonio Puerta and Dani Jarque, the retirements of Real Madrid midfielder Rubén de la Red and Salamanca midfielder Miguel García, and the ongoing struggles of Sevilla defender Sergio Sánchez, all due to heart problems, one can only hope that this young man has not been struck down with such health problems.

- Manolo Preciado sent the verbal volleys all week at José Mourinho for the latter’s insinuation that Preciado sent in a scrub squad against Barcelona earlier in the season because Preciado knew they would lose, and the bite and venom translated not only through his words but through to his players, as Sporting Gijón showed little respect for Real Madrid with their hard tackling and general sniping with the Real players.  Mourinho’s team got the last laugh with Gonzalo Higuaín’s late winner to walk away from El Molinón with the three points, but if one team in Spain will die for their trainer, it is the Sporting Gijón players for their firebrand Manolo Preciado.

Early in the second half, before Angel di María opened the scoring with a sublime curler to the right far post to give Real Madrid the 0-1 lead, “El Especial,” José Mourinho, lambasted referee Antonio Mateu Lahoz for showing a yellow card on Sergio Ramos for an apparent trip on young Real Sociedad starlet Antoine Griezmann.  Replays showed that Griezmann fooled Mateu Lahoz by tripping himself and baited the referee to flash yellow.  Whether Mourinho actually saw what transpired or merely stood up for his player, he infused a renewed energy into his team that had frankly been outplayed in all facets of the match by the Basques from San Sebastián.  One minute later, di María gave Madrid a one-goal cushion.

Some teams respond to a manager that stays calm despite the chaos surrounding them.  Last season, Manuel Pellegrini led Los Blancos with this type of tranquil and stolid style, and they earned their highest point total in their illustrious history and in the history of La Liga prior to last season.  The only problem was that Barcelona also broke this record and pipped them at the end by three points with an astonishing ninety-nine points out of a possible one hundred fourteen.

In their three most important matches of last season, the two El Clásico fixtures and the second leg against Olympique Lyonnais in the first knockout round of the UEFA Champions League, Real Madrid could not muster the strength and character to overcome the deficit in any of these matches.  Was it Pellegrini’s fault that they lost these three matches?  Not in the least.  Did Pellegrini do anything extra within the match to lift his team above the level at which they were playing?  Unfortunately for the Madridistas, the answer again was no.

José Mourinho, whether coincidental or intentional, affects his team from the technical area in each match they play, and when Mourinho feels that he needs to berate the referee, the linesmen, or the fourth official to get his point across while catalyzing his players at the same time, he will do so.  With Real Sociedad outplaying and beating Real Madrid to most of the loose balls in the first half, Mourinho needed to perform some of his world-famous magic to pull his team across the sea of blue and white at the Estadio Anoeta.

Real Madrid somewhat got shafted by the schedule makers who slotted them into the late Saturday kickoff after dismantling Ajax in the Champions League a mere seventy-two hours prior whereas both Valencia and Barcelona received Sunday kickoffs after playing in the Champions League on Tuesday, two extra days to recover from their exertions in the midweek.  Despite this quick turnaround, Mourinho did not make any changes to his starting eleven.

As for Real Sociedad, manager Martín Lasarte also kept his lineup mainly intact from the team that gave up the late equalizer to Almería on Monday to prevent a perfect two-for-two start, the only change being the 19-year-old Antoine Griezmann slotting into the left attacking midfield spot in place of Francisco Sutil.

That modification proved a brilliant move as Griezmann, along with Raúl Tamudo and Xabi Prieto created several chances that cut through the Real Madrid defense.  Two opportunities, in particular, should have given Real Sociedad at least one goal but probably two goals to send Real Madrid into panic mode within the first half-hour of the match.

In the sixth minute, Xabi Prieto provided the perfect curling cross from the right wing for Griezmann, who was unmarked in front of the penalty spot, but Griezmann struck his header over the bar.  He could do nothing but place his hands over his face in bewilderment and disgust about wasting a well-engineered opening.

In the twenty-fifth minute, Griezmann again missed a golden chance to give Real Sociedad the lead when he missed a yard right of Casillas’ right near post.  From a long ball from goalkeeper Claudio Bravo, it eventually led to Raúl Tamudo sending Griezmann in with a nicely weighted through ball into the box, but Griezmann’s left-footed effort, that fooled Casillas as he dove to his right, went wide.

On a handful of occasions, man of the match Ricardo Carvalho prevented the culmination of well-worked Sociedad moves to keep his club level with the Erreala.  Just after the half-hour mark, Carvalho slid in and toe-poked away a certain goal for Tamudo after Xabi Prieto provided the squared cross across the face of goal to the right back post.  Without Carvalho’s intervention, Tamudo had a sliding tap-in from two yards away.

A few minutes after Real Sociedad equalized at 1-1, Carvalho again prevented a potential scoring chance as he stuck a foot out to prevent Xabi Prieto’s through ball that would have certainly put in Tamudo toward goal.  Mourinho has managed Carvalho at three different clubs, FC Porto, Chelsea, and Real Madrid, and even when Mourinho coached at the San Siro for Inter Milan, he wanted to purchase Carvalho from Chelsea to consolidate his central defense.  Like Gerard Piqué currently and Fabio Cannavaro from the recent past, Carvalho’s strengths as a central defender are not necessarily in his pace or physical strength (although he has both) but in his positioning and passing ability from the back, and Saturday’s match against Real Sociedad showed this characteristics in full display.

The familiar story read through at the fulltime whistle, and Real Madrid somehow left the Estadio Anoeta pitch with the three points and left their Basque hosts in disbelief.  Madrid’s second and decisive goal propitiously came off a massive deflection from Pepe’s back after he could not duck away from Cristiano Ronaldo’s free kick, and despite Sociedad creating more and better chances, the indomitable spirit that has not enveloped this team often enough pulled them through a tough match on the road.

When a lower side achieves a victory over a top-level club, they capitalize on small number of breaks they have during the course of ninety minutes.  Real Sociedad deserved to share the points with Real Madrid, but whereas Hércules converted twice on the few chances they had against Barcelona, Sociedad were not efficient with their numerous chances.

Real Madrid will not score 102 goals as they did last year, far from it.  They will not sparkle in attack as their extravagant eternal rivals to the northeast in FC Barcelona.  While some of the Madridistas will loathe Mourinho’s lack of flair when it comes to the play on the pitch, Mourinho only cares about winning and not necessarily pleasing the supporters (sorry Alfredo Di Stéfano).

The following statement is no slight to previous manager Manuel Pellegrini, but Real Madrid likely would have not won this type of match last year when they were not playing their best.  José Mourinho provides that belief in self that has characterized all of his previous teams.  Despite their relatively mediocre performance, they stuck with it and got the winner, however fortunate that goal was.  With this kind of fight and non-wavering spirit, Real Madrid might have that little extra to pip Barcelona to the title.

Fueras de Juego

- FC Barcelona broke Atlético Madrid’s hoodoo over them at the Estadio Vicente Calderón with an entertaining, yet physical 1-2 victory on Sunday evening, but Tomáš Ujfaluši took this physicality over the edge when he flew into Lionel Messi ankle in stoppage time and immediately received a red card for the challenge.  Messi’s ankle visibly swelled within seconds of the tackle, and while the Culés can breathe a sigh of relief that he will only be out for a couple of weeks, there are calls for the competition committee to invoke Article 97 that could raise Ujfaluši’s suspension from 1-3 matches to 4-12 matches.  Article 97 is conjured when an incident “occurs in a violent manner, resulting in harmful consequences considered serious by its nature.”

- Through the first twenty-five minutes, Hércules looked hungover from their monumental victory over Barcelona as their derby rival Valencia brought the Alicante club down to Earth with two splendid goals from Juan Mata and Pablo Hernández.  To Herculés’ credit, they rose from the canvas after Valencia punched them in the mouth with a penalty kick goal from David Trézéguet after David Navarro handled the ball in the box and a commencement of an assault on Valencia’s goal after Navarro received a rather dubious second yellow card.  Valencia held on for a 1-2 road victory and is now the only team in La Liga to earn the maximum nine points from their first three matches.

- Levante and Real Zaragoza appear doomed to relegation this early in the season after they both looked awful on Sunday afternoon.

The rumors, for once, came to fruition, as FC Barcelona will pay a transfer fee of €40 million to Valencia for Spanish international striker David Villa.  This tango (or the sardana for a more local, Catalunyan flair) danced by the two clubs since the previous offseason will finally end as outgoing Barça president Joan Laporta landed the player he coveted for two years.

Surely, Barcelona signed Villa to be a starting forward, and his most effective position in that front line would be as the center forward of the three-pronged attack.  With Lionel Messi and Pedro Rodríguez on either side of Villa, the Barcelona attacking machine will continue to operate as efficiently and dangerously as ever.

What does this mean for Zlatan Ibrahimovic?

Zlatan Ibrahimovic was supposed to be the answer in the center of Barcelona’s attack.  In order to lure the Swedish hitman from Inter Milan, the Catalunyans spent a net total of €69 million (€46 million in cash, the transfer of Samuel Eto’o from Barça to Inter, valued at €20 million, and another €3 million to compensate for Alyaksandr Hleb refusing the transfer to Inter).

Ibrahimovic had the qualities that Eto’o supposedly lacked: the ability to hold the ball up for his teammates, the acumen to visualize the perfect pass before the action occurs, and the size to better compete for headers and ward off physical challenges.  Even though Eto’o scored thirty goals and led the Pichichi race for top goalscorer most of the 2008-09 La Liga season until Diego Forlán surpassed him late in the season, the Barcelona staff felt they needed more from the center forward role than a pure poacher in the box, at which Eto’o was one of the best in the world.

Through the first few months of the season, Ibrahimovic made an immediate impact with the team, scoring in the first match of the season against Sporting Gijón, providing the only goal in El Clásico against Real Madrid in November after coming back from a hamstring injury, and netting twelve goals in his first nineteen matches in all competitions.

As the season wore on, however, his efficacy in front of goal dwindled considerably.  The match against Real Zaragoza in March clearly showed how his confidence had dropped, when he fluffed three chances that Ibrahimovic would score on his worst days.  He did score in that match but only because of a late penalty that Messi gave to him so that he could regain his confidence.

Aside from the first leg in the quarterfinals of the Champions League against Arsenal where he scored twice at the Emirates Stadium, he was noticeably absent both on and off the pitch in Barcelona’s most important matches.  Pep Guardiola lost so much faith in Ibrahimovic at the climax of the campaign that in both legs of the Champions League semifinal against his former team Inter Milan, Guardiola substituted him in both matches at the hour mark because of his ineffectiveness.  In La Liga, where Real Madrid kept the title race within three points until the final matchday, Guardiola favored Bojan Krkic over Ibrahimovic as the center forward.

Cumulatively, Ibrahimovic had twenty-one goals and ten assists in forty-one matches in all competitions, and while these are solid numbers for a player making his debut season in a new league and country, solid was not the expectation that the Blaugrana set for him.  Replacing a Barça legend in Samuel Eto’o would always become an arduous task, and the Barça boardroom sent a message to Ibrahimovic that he did not fulfill what they envisaged for him with the signing of David Villa.

As any good agent should do, Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s agent, Mino Raiola, tried to quell any sort of talk that the arrival of David Villa spelled the end for Ibrahimovic at the Camp Nou.  In an interview with Calciomercato.it, Raiola reiterated his client’s standing with FC Barcelona:

“The club already said they were happy with Zlatan.  Villa’s arrival has nothing to do with Ibra, and it does not put his stay in danger seeing that Villa can play well on the wings.  He has a contract until 2014, and he is happy at Barcelona.”

As optimistic as that sounds, it could mean trouble for Pedro, Bojan, Jeffrén Suárez, and others in La Masia if Barcelona plans to keep both Ibrahimovic and Villa, but with Pedro breaking through with an outstanding season and Bojan filling Ibrahimovic’s shoes at the end of the season, it is highly doubtful that Barcelona, and specifically Pep Guardiola, would stunt the development of their own academy products in favor of Ibrahimovic.

One year for any player should not become the absolute barometer for what that player will do in the future.  There is an endless amount of cases where players struggled in their first season only to recover and perform to their highest capabilities.  In this day of immediate gratification and astronomical transfer fees, however, instantaneous results matter, and Zlatan Ibrahimovic has not given Barcelona what they wanted.  If Barcelona did not make a move for Villa and Ibrahimovic was given a clean slate to go into his second season with Barcelona, a betting man would put his money on a highly successful season.

Barcelona is not a betting man and wanted reassurances with the signing of David Villa.  When Barcelona sells Ibrahimovic, they will not nearly receive the value that they paid for Ibra, but they will listen to any offers that come their way.

The last opinion that Barcelona would want of themselves is that they are acting like Real Madrid in buying top talent for exorbitant prices, so a rotation that would bench Villa and Ibrahimovic for certain matches would only further this growing perception that Barcelona is turning into their eternal rivals.

Ajax, Juventus, Inter Milan, and now Barcelona.  Four of the preeminent teams in European football, and Zlatan Ibrahimovic could not establish a permanent home in any of those clubs.  If a club can solve the enigma that is Zlatan Ibrahimovic, he would become the most feared striker in the world.  If.

Once Lionel Messi scored his club record-tying 34th goal of the season in the 76th minute to increase the lead to 4-0, the 98,772 Culés at the Camp Nou, save for a few hundred Real Valladolid die-hards, began to chant the song that every team wants to hear at the end of the season, “Campeones, campeones, ¡Olé, olé, olé!”  For the final fifteen minutes, the procession commenced on the pitch.

Bojan Krkic came out for Thierry Henry, likely Henry’s final appearance for Barcelona because of his increasingly diminished role with Pedro Rodríguez and Bojan ahead of him in the pecking order.

Dani Alves departed in the 80th minute for Zlatan Ibrahimovic, a player who epitomizes the cliché that there are two halves of a season.  Despite Ibrahimovic’s struggles in the last three months, the supporters gave Ibrahimovic a nice round of applause.

The heartiest plaudits, however, rained down on Pedro when Pep Guardiola took him out in the 86th minute for Andrés Iniesta.  An infrequent contributor last season, Pedro rose to the occasion nearly every time Guardiola called his name this season, and after fifty-one appearances and twenty-three goals in all competitions, Pedro made himself a fixture as one of the starting three forwards for FC Barcelona.

Referee Miguel Ángel Pérez Lasa whistled for fulltime at the ninety-minute mark, and Barcelona won its fourth La Liga crown in six years and their twentieth overall.

Despite the 4-0 scoreline, Valladolid accounted well for themselves and displayed the aggression on both ends of the pitch early that Javier Clemente-led teams always show.  Ever the entertaining yet obstinate manager during press conferences, Clemente verbalized the fighting spirit that Valladolid would have against Barcelona with colorful imagery:

“We will not go like lambs to the slaughter.  I would rather be a bull, which gives its all and dies angrily.  Let us see whether we will die or not, but if we do, we will do it with our boots on.  We have nothing left to fear.  We must go there bravely.”

Nearly invoking the spirit of Franklin Delano Roosevelt with his impassioned plea, Clemente sought the desire, will, and all of those wonderful intangibles from his players that would be necessary to achieve any sort of positive result against Barcelona.

In a bizarre twist of fate, Mr. Clemente, one of the most hated enemies of Real Madrid, could have aided Madrid’s faint hopes of winning La Liga if Valladolid could prevent Barcelona from earning the three points.  Real Madrid had to beat Málaga and pray for Barça not to win in order to secure their 32nd championship.

Besides winning two La Liga crowns in 1983 and 1984 with Athletic Bilbao on the last day of both seasons with Real finishing second both seasons, he had a reputation of excluding Real Madrid players in favor of Basque players during his tenure as Spanish national team manager in the 1990s.  No one player felt this cold shoulder more than Real Madrid legend and current Getafe manager Míchel.

Míchel was part of the illustrious Quinta del Buitre quintet of homegrown players for Real Madrid in the 1980s and early 1990s that won two UEFA Cups and five consecutive domestic titles, and Míchel made himself a fixture on the Spanish national team.  He earned sixty-six caps to his name when Clemente became Spain’s manager in 1992, and despite his continued excellent play with Los Blancos in the prime of his career, Clemente never called him up for Spain.  At a young twenty-nine years, his international career ended prematurely.

Clemente favored Barcelona right wing Ion Andoni Goikoetxea over Míchel, and while Goikoetxea featured the hard-working and industrious characteristics that Clemente loved and coveted, he did not have nearly the skill or creativity that Míchel brought to the table.  In defense of Goikoetxea, he did win the Don Balón award for Spanish player of the year in 1991 and was a significant member of Johan Cruijff’s Dream Team that won four consecutive La Liga crowns and the 1992 European Cup over Sampdoria, but for Clemente to leave Míchel completely off Spain’s squad and not even grant him a seat on the substitute’s bench stung Míchel and continues to sting him to this day.

Despite the history, the Madridistas would instantly forgive Javier Clemente Lázaro if he prevented the Barcelona machine from rolling to one last victory.

The “thank you” letters from Real Madrid, however, nearly needed to be written for Víctor Valdés, as his penchant to show his footballing skills virtually handed Valladolid the opening goal in the fourth minute.

Receiving a simple back pass from Gerard Piqué, Valdés’ first touch on the ball got away from him, and eying this unexpected opportunity, Valladolid left back Antonio Barragán pounced on the ball.  Valdés tried to recover from his error by clearing it to safety, but Barragán deflected his clearance as he slid in to tackle the ball away from Valdés, and the ball fell right into the path of Manucho just inside the top of the penalty box.  Whether Manucho felt he needed merely to guide it toward the empty net or the bounce prevented him from striking the ball cleanly, he hit the ball with his shin, but it was heading to the back of the net.

Because Manucho’s did not crack his shot with the greatest conviction, there was a slight chance that a Barcelona defender could knock his shot away from goal, and who other than the captain and defensive stalwart, Carles Puyol, to race into the box and commit to a diving clearance that sent the ball to the touchline.

When Luís Prieto deviated an innocuous Pedro cross into his own net in the 27th minute to gift Barça the 1-0 lead, the title was destined to be retained by the Catalunyans for another season.  Valladolid could not get into the game as Barcelona played their possession style, and the “plan” that Clemente championed and rightly refused to reveal prior to the match failed miserably.

Lionel Messi scored twice and assisted Pedro in the backbreaking second goal, but the man of the match award must go to Touré Yaya, who took on the responsibility of playmaker because of Xavi Hernández’s suspension.  After the first fifteen to twenty minutes, where they could not penetrate the Valladolid and resorted to long-distance efforts, Yaya controlled the match from the midfield on both offense and defense.

Nothing encapsulated Touré Yaya’s impact as the conductor more than Barça’s third goal that prevented any thought of a miracle comeback by Valladolid.  After receiving a pass from Sergio Busquets, Yaya nutmegged Raúl Rodríguez Navas and then hurdled Henrique Sereno’s sliding challenge as he charged into the box, where his cutback pass from the endline found Messi, and with a wide-open goal, he rolled it in for the 3-0 advantage.  Touré Yaya will likely leave in the summer because Busquets has succeeded him as Barça’s holding midfielder, and if this eventually becomes the final appearance for Yaya in a Barcelona uniform, he went out with one of his best performances as a Barça player.

Even though Real Madrid only managed a 1-1 draw with Málaga, the spirit and gusto of the Real players dropped considerably when they found out what was happening at the Camp Nou, so one cannot assume that this result would have occurred if the Barcelona – Valladolid match were much closer.  FC Barcelona, however, did not want to have the championship decided on Real Madrid’s result against Málaga, and they merited the La Liga trophy in typical Barça flair in their 4-0 drubbing of Real Valladolid.

Ninety-six points in a season is a ridiculous amount, the most points accumulated in the history of La Liga prior to this season.  Unfortunately for Real Madrid, one other team eclipsed that point total in the same season.  While the 2009-10 FC Barcelona club did not defend their Champions League trophy, ninety-nine points in the league and a +74 goal difference (98 for and 24 against) are accomplishments that will be on par with any that Barcelona has ever achieved.  With all of their young talent under contract for the next several years along with the economic firepower that the club possesses, László Kubala’s five cup season of 1952, Cruijff’s “Total Football” of the 1970s, and Cruijff’s Dream Team of the 1990s could take a backseat to this current Barcelona incarnation.

It also helps that Lionel Messi declared that he could never see himself playing for Real Madrid or at any other club.

Fueras de Juego

- Another upheaval in the Bernabéu seems likely as they failed to win any silverware this season.  Manuel Pellegrini deserves another season to mold this team, but with José Mourinho possibly available in the summer (although he would employ a more pragmatic style that the Madridistas and the Real boardroom hated when Fabio Capello WON the league in 2006), Real’s failure to advance past the Round of 16 in the Champions League (although the previous seven Real managers did not pass this stage), their debacle against Alcorcón in the Copa del Rey (although Real does not really care about this competition and had not won this since 1993), and second-place in the league to Barcelona (although they amassed an obscene ninety-six points and scored 102 goals), Pellegrini may not get the chance to improve on what any other team would consider a great season.  Fabio Capello was right when he compared managing Real Madrid to living in a goldfish bowl.

- Getafe cruised to sixth place and a Europa League berth when they defeated Atlético Madrid’s B-side 0-3 at the Vicente Calderón on Saturday evening.  The players and the colchoneros in the stands celebrated their Europa League triumph and looked forward to the Copa del Rey final against Sevilla on Wednesday rather than worry about a league match that did not matter to them, and Getafe could not have been happier to take advantage.

- RCD Mallorca felt the ecstasy and agony of football in a span of a couple of minutes.  After dismissing Espanyol 2-0 at the ONO Estadi, they watched the final minutes of the Almería – Sevilla match on the big screen at the stadium.  At the time, it was 2-2, and if that result held, Mallorca would be in the Champions League for finishing fourth in the league.  In the third minute of stoppage time, however, Sevilla youngster Rodri twisted himself around to score past Esteban Suárez and send Sevilla into the Champions League.  The juxtaposition of Mallorca captain Nunes’ despair with the champagne bottle standing right behind him showed how close they were to the bright lights of the top European club competition.

- Racing Santander saved themselves from relegation with a 2-0 victory over a more-than-willing Sporting Gijón, and Barça blasted Valladolid 4-0, but the other three teams in the relegation battle (Xerez, Tenerife, and Málaga) were involved in intense matches where one goal in any of those matches would have ramifications for the others.  Xerez needed to beat Osasuna and hope that two other teams involved in the relegation fight would not earn a point.  Xerez could only muster a 1-1 draw against Osasuna, so Néstor Gorosito’s reclamation project fell just short of an all-time great escape.

That left two teams for one spot in La Liga.  Málaga had the head-to-head tiebreaker over Tenerife, so Tenerife needed to better Málaga’s result for salvation, except for one caveat: if Valladolid, Málaga, and Tenerife were tied on points for 17th place and another season in the top flight, Tenerife would stay in La Liga because they scored more goals than the other two teams amongst matches against them, the fourth tiebreaker.  As complicated as that sounds, a Tenerife loss would not necessarily doom them.

Tenerife played as though they were doomed.  Tenerife keeper Sergio Aragoneses must have felt like those body-shaped silhouettes at a shooting range because Valencia pelted his goal with shot after shot after shot.  Luckily for Aragoneses, David Villa, David Silva, and Juan Mata did not start for Valencia because their clinical finishing would have converted some of the fourteen chances at goal.  Miraculously, it was 0-0 late into the match, and Nino flew down the right flank unmarked, heading toward Miguel Ángel Moyà’s goal.  Hedwiges Maduro’s incredible speed, however, caught up to Nino in the box, and the opportunity was gone.

Alexis scored in the second minute of stoppage time for Valencia to give Valencia the 1-0 win, but with the other matches falling Tenerife’s way, only a Málaga result against Real Madrid would drop them to the second division.  Málaga did the seemingly impossible and got the draw at home to revive their stay in the first division for another season.

- This final weekend of the season became swan songs for three that have served their respective professions to the highest degree: Joseba Etxeberria, Rubén Baraja, and referee Manuel Mejuto González.  Mejuto González’s last match will be on Wednesday as the referees the Copa del Rey final, but his La Liga career ended on Saturday in the Athletic Bilbao – Deportivo La Coruña match.  Etxeberria and Baraja both won, and both could not contain their emotions, as they were both given heroes’ exits by their clubs.

Congratulations to Barcelona on winning the 2009-10 La Liga title. More pictures after the jump.

Throughout Barcelona’s two-year run of groundbreaking excellence, Josep Guardiola i Sala role as a tactician tended to be undervalued.  He reinstituted the “Total Football” concept that Johan Cruyff, Guardiola’s former manager at FC Barcelona, instilled when he was a player and a manager at the club, and he changed the culture inside the dressing room.

He sent bad influences Deco and Ronaldinho away, and he brought a sense of discipline and accountability that the club lacked at the end of the Frank Rijkaard era.  When it came to the X and O’s of a match, however, most defined the team in his reign as a beautiful machine that only possessed a “Plan A” of ball possession and incessant attack.

If anyone still doubted Pep Guardiola as a tactical grandmaster, the last two matches against Arsenal and Real Madrid should validate his place as one of the top managers in world football.

Debuted against Arsenal during the second half of the second leg of the Champions League quarterfinal, Guardiola insisted on the 4-4-2 formation to handle Real Madrid’s abundance of offensive talent.  Partly forced by injuries but mostly a tactical decision, the Barça starting eleven was a departure from the norm.  Guardiola brought Dani Alves forward as a right midfielder/winger and positioned Seydou Keita as a left midfielder.  Carles Puyol went to right back, and Gabriel Milito filled in alongside Gerard Piqué in central defense.

With Éric Abidal reinjuring his thigh against Arsenal, the question surrounding the left back position was if Maxwell would receive the nod against Real Madrid.  Maxwell is the natural replacement, but in some instances this season, the opposition caught him out of position when he would make his forward runs.  With Marcelo and Cristiano Ronaldo racing down the left flank, there would be a decent possibility of a defensive breakdown with Maxwell absent from the action.  Rather than putting Carles Puyol in a left back role that he rarely ever plays, Guardiola kept faith with Maxwell in their most important match of the La Liga season.

The first few minutes of the match suggested that this pivotal game would be more akin to the tightly contested edition in November than the open affair at the Bernabéu last May.  The suffocating Barça press swarmed even harder, and the Real Madrid tackling came with more regularity and venom.

Guardiola positioned his team to quell Real Madrid’s lightning counter-attack, and apart from a couple of instances when Cristiano Ronaldo’s pure talent and speed would defy any defense, Barcelona’s defensive organization and discipline kept firm.  A clean sheet through forty-five minutes and zero shots on goal allowed testified to the Blaugrana’s security in the midfield and in front of Víctor Valdés.

With a one-goal lead to start the second half, Guardiola readjusted his formation, bringing Dani Alves back to his usual right back role and moving Carles Puyol into central defense, creating a five-man back line to consolidate an already strong defense.  Guardiola knew that his counterpart Manuel Pellegrini would send wave after wave of attacks in the second half to score the equalizing goal, and he felt a reinforcement to stem this oncoming tide would be prudent.  Hardly characterizing this change as protectionist with Dani Alves and Maxwell still marauding both flanks, Real Madrid found Puyol, Piqué, and Milito to be uncompromising and intelligent in their tackling and positioning.

Two clean sheets against Real Madrid this season substantiated Barcelona’s claim as more than a club who only worries about scoring goals.

Manuel Pellegrini is no fledgling manager either, and with Real Madrid’s midfield and defensive organization at its season best, it would take more invention and guile than individual splendor to break down their white wall.  Who better than Xavi Hernández to solve the problem.

For a player that has and continues to receive numerous accolades throughout his illustrious career, Xavi does not get the full credit for his contributions to Futbol Club Barcelona.  He always had a transcendent talent on his team that would garner the headlines: first, it was Rivaldo; then it was Ronaldinho; and now it is Lionel Messi.  Others would scoff at their teammates for stealing the limelight, but Xavi would want nothing more than to provide assists for his fellow colleagues as well as deflecting praise to them and his manager.

For Xavi’s first masterpiece, he executed a cheeky lofted ball over the Madrid defense to perfection.  Constantly scanning the field for any potential passes to befuddle the opposition, he saw Messi make a run from the corner of his eye.  He had two options: an incisive through ball in between the defenders or a ball over the defense.  He chose the latter (the much more difficult option), and Raúl Albiol watched in horror as the ball floated over his head onto the chest of Messi, who chested it to his right to create space and smack it past Iker Casillas for the vital first goal.

Xavi’s second offering early in the second half sealed the match.  Again, he spotted a run of his teammate in his peripheral vision.  Pedro made a diagonal run, and Xavi obliged his effort by slotting a perfect through ball that hit the moving target as well as directing it into a position where Álvaro Arbeloa could not come around Pedro to tackle the ball away.  Pedro curled his shot past Casillas, and the 0-2 lead proved insurmountable.

Besides his inventive and sagacious ball distribution, his ability off the ball remains underrated.  Sergio Busquets and Touré Yaya are known to be the pivots of the Barça midfield as well as the protectors of the back four, but Xavi is the epitome of a box-to-box midfielder.  His harassment of any Madrid player on the ball forced them to rush their movements, causing a few turnovers in compromising areas of the pitch.  On several occasions, he fully committed to decisive tackles that broke up feasible goal-scoring opportunities for Real Madrid.

It is no coincidence that Xavi Hernández and Josep Guardiola would mastermind a crucial victory in Barcelona’s attempt to repeat as Spanish champions.  When Barcelona won their first European Cup in 1992, Guardiola led the midfield as that deep-lying playmaker that controlled the game without having to score.  As Guardiola started to age, Xavi became the natural successor to Guardiola in his position, and Xavi’s teams have won two UEFA Champions League titles, the second with his former teammate Guardiola as manager.

Lionel Messi and Pedro Rodríguez scored yet again in an important match, and the plaudits showered on these two for their brilliant individual moments are richly deserved.  Behind all great forwards, however, are the midfielders that provide them with the potent ball to pierce the defense.  While Messi creates opportunities for himself due to his amazing ability, he would be the first to say that without Xavi governing the midfield as a maestro and conductor and Pep Guardiola continually instructing in training and in the heat of a match, he would not have matured into the historic figure he has already become.

Fueras de Juego

- Cristiano Ronaldo played his part, consistently flying down both flanks in search of any opening that Barcelona allowed, but his anxiety to prove he is better than Lionel Messi and worth the €94 million transfer fee left his teammates out of the loop as he single-handedly tried to beat Barça on his own.  Gonzalo Higuaín supplied the most disappointing performance for Real Madrid, as he could not carve out a decent chance against Puyol and the gang.  Although it was not entirely his fault, the papers will again spout out how he flatters to deceive in the grandest occasions despite scoring a tremendous amount of goals.

In case of El Clásico blinkers, there were other matches in La Liga this weekend.

- Sevilla defeated Málaga 1-2 in an Andalusian derby, but both Andrés Palop and Gustavo Munúa provided classic moments for those blooper highlight reels.  For Palop, he failed to secure a routine shot from Duda, and the ensuing spill gave Felipe Caicedo a simple tap-in for Málaga to take the lead.

Sevilla’s equalizer from Juan Cala came about from an embarrassing error by Munúa.  Ivica Dragutinovic’s free kick floated straight into Munúa’s chest, but he somehow fumbled and mishandled it as if he caught a burning rock, and Cala could not believe his luck as he tapped in his goal.

Málaga was disgraceful with their constant play-acting and time-wasting tactics, and cosmic justice reigned supreme as Lolo headed the winning goal late in the contest.

- Athletic Bilbao notched the most comprehensive victory of the weekend with their 4-1 drubbing of Almería at the San Mamés, and the score flattered Almería.  Javi Martínez exhibited why Rafa Benítez and Liverpool are following his every move closely.  Two goals and industry in the midfield further cemented him as one of Liverpool’s summer transfer targets as the Reds try to find the replacement for Xabi Alonso that Alberto Aquilani has failed to achieve to this point.

Bilbao pelted Almería goalkeeper Diego Alves with twenty-six total shots, thirteen on target, but the most impressive stat of the match for Athletic Club was that they committed only nine fouls for the whole ninety minutes.  Nine fouls in ninety minutes for Athletic Bilbao would be analogous to Barcelona only having 50% of the possession.  It hardly ever happens.

- Valencia’s Manuel Fernandes might want to hide under a rock tonight after a torrid game against Mallorca.  Admittedly a midfielder forced into central defense due to a host of injuries, Fernandes committed elementary errors in defense, including getting continually beat over the top and stranding his own keeper César Sánchez a couple of times with short back passes.

The coup de grâce came when he netted into his own goal from a Gonzalo Castro cross to hinder any chance for Valencia to salvage a point.  To cap off a miserable performance, Fernandes was sent off late in the match for a clumsy tackle on Aritz Aduriz.

Pablo Hernández scored late for Los Che to intensify the last few minutes, but Mallorca dominated Valencia despite the 3-2 final scoreline, and Valencia’s miserable week ended with a thud at the ONO Estadi.