Sunday 14 December 2008

One More Down, Next?


First of all, Enjoy the Clasico win, it was well deserved and well earned, we are a team hunting for titles, in a complicated game like this one, we won scoring twice, conceded no goals, and we are now twelve points away of our direct rivals, nothing can take that away, that was a cheerful victory.


Madrid:

They played as expected; I already predicted the tactical plan and players moves in the animated presentation posted in the preview, even though with some different names- and I think that presentation explain more than what I may write, so lets keep this Article SHORT.

(Click the Image for Animated presentation, Loading time Depend on your Internet connection quality)

I was impressed by Metzelder to be honest with you, even though in Eto’o goal he carry some responsibility but to play a game like that after being out since ever was a surprise, Gago did well trying to contain Xavi, Ramos was better than his standards this season and Casillas was their man of the match.

Palanca, Espanyol youth team product, may become one of Juande discoveries, even though he is a key members for the Castilla, Juande picked him over some other more accomplished options for a substitute, and he did relatively well, taking in consideration the game conditions.

But what about the dirty tactics?! I will not judge if it was right or wrong, but no one can ignore the fact that it was dirty, I can understand tactical fouls to stop the game, slow down the ball, or even to stop a player, but to give the instruction “kick their Achilles”! That’s not acceptable, especially when we know – and it was obvious- that it was a Juande Ramos instruction. Not only against Messi, but no doubt he was the main target! That was DIRTY!

Juande Succeeded to avoid a disastrous result, but this game is off record and tells nothing about how he will reshape Real Madrid; obviously they cannot play more games using that tactic, so let’s see if he can create a team that is as good punching the opponent as covering their faces to avoid being punched.

Barcelona:

Real Madrid Played the kind of games that bother us, a small team strategy applied by the club of the century, as nominated by that FIFA– they had their reasons to apply this system but its not my concern- may be they were surprised of what they achieved – complicating the game for Barcelona – but for us Barcelona fans we have seen this happening again and again when we played against teams like Numancia, Sporting, Malaga, and you can name at least ten more teams in la liga who park the bus, close spaces and live to defend, trying to steal a point or rub a goal, the only difference was that the mentioned teams do not have quality players like Canavaro, Ramos, Gago… So this bus was more complicated, a little.

We honestly helped them a little more; we had a drop in form, its reasonable and expected, but in the wrong timing, we were so in a hurry to score that even Puyol rushed out of his box to the opposite side with Abidal and Yaya to do what they felt Messi, Xavi, Eto’o, Henry and Gudjhonsen were not able to do, offering more spaces for Madrid to counter attack, and to believe they can steal a win. Messi was not right playing on the right, he closed the right flank standing in Alves path and with Henry opening wide on the left, Eto’o became more isolated as old days, Messi tried to cut inside – when he was not shot in the feet- but still he was more on the right flank than as a free role playmaker, or even a striker in front of Henry and Eto’o, he would have been able to make more Mess between Canavaro and Metzelder if he moved more there.

Eto’o was contained, Henry made good runs exhausting Salgado, but still not enough threat knowing that his flank was the weak side of Madrid, while Drenthe and Ramos worked on our right, Salgado didn’t find enough support from Sneijder or Guti. Now I am not saying he was bad, he actually was one of our dangerous players in the game, but he is more convincing when he plays in the box than on the flank.

Xavi did his work even though not with the same brilliance, Gudi started the game fine then faded more and more till he turned to a walking disaster in the second half, Yaya was a monster getting back the ball and spreading fear, but was caught out of position sometimes specially in the first half, now before you punch me for saying that watch Real Madrid counters again and check where Yaya stands, knowing that his territory is the circle and the surrounding, he still also have that Virus I mentioned before, when things turn to be complicated, he leave his duty and jump with the ball in the Mix, it make fans cheer but it hurts the team, I know you don’t like it when I say it, but I will stick to what I said in the last paragraph -off Record (here), even when one of his attempts was so close to end with a historical goal, that change nothing. He is a great player but either he fix this bug in his style, or Guardiola need to give instructions to one of the midfielders to drop back to cover behind him when he move forward, a third option is to play him in the third midfielder position beside Xavi while Busquets play as a defensive midfielder.

Alves did a good game; Puyol was Brilliant aside of his moves forward with the ball, Marquez was the Marshal while Abidal had a solid game.

Busquets showed he is a winning card and not a back up, and wasn’t that Hleb who –again- initiated the counter of the second goal?

Valdes, my man of the match! He kept us in the game, and I hope no one is still hunting him for his old mistakes, this season he is so far the best Goalkeeper in the liga – yea I forgot no one, he is the best performer so far!

Again Fitness level was an advantage for us, they obviously got exhausted, and when you calculate the average age of the Defense its easy to expect that.

Now that’s a fast evaluation without getting in depth with tactical analysis so we don’t make it one of the long articles, I hope you enjoyed the game.

For two days we tried our best to make an extensive –TV like – coverage for the Clasico, the big event of the season, hopefully this team make us more busy preparing for Mega Events, like Champions' league Final for example!

But for Now, lets drown the submarine!

Ramzi Tanani

20 comments:

Harshawardhan said...

Good article again Ramzi.. Yes its the submarine next which will drown in the blaugrana sea!!
By the way, some idiot on Goal.com has compared the Pep Team to ManU.
WTF?
We are a unique team with a unique style of play and we do not want to be compared to ManU or any other bloody team.
We are infact, Mes que un club...

pep said...

Well deserved win.


It was kind of worrying to see the unbalance in our team with almost all danger coming from the right wing. This shows again that for the big games we need someone else for that left wing.

This was a game where Iniesta could have been pulled back to play alongside Xavi in midfield. Gudjohnsen was a bad choice by Guardiola there. Busquets or Hleb would have been better. Now Madrid closed down Xavi and that blocked our game too easily.


Madrid played a good game and that says it all: they just have a mediocre team and they can't play much more than defending. Schuster would have done as well, I guess. Ramos still have to show he can attack in an organized way.

You should of course take into account the injured and suspended players, although I think Robben is the only one of their non-available players who could have changed this game.


Twelve points is a lot. If Villareal doesn't win against Sevilla tonight, we have eight points on the second placed. And Atletico Madrid and Deportivo could jump over Madrid... Now we have to focus on closing this year in a nice way against Villareal.


Visca'l Barça!

Anonymous said...

Well deserved victory. Madrid played well (leaving aside cheap tactics to injure Messi) and were almost impenetrable at most times.

Casillas had a brilliant game. Unfortunate that he ended up on the losing side. The scoreline could have been easily 4-0.

Valdes too, on the other hand had a great game. Made at least a couple vital saves.

Anonymous said...

Dani Alves was awesome(except for that one mistake early). The Man of the Match for me. Note, that he gets little or no midfielfd cover and does both the attacting and defending with great effectiveness.
ok, i ve been watching puyol for 10 yrs since he made his debut and no one ever criticizes him becoz of his passion and energy throughout the game but really he has no tactical understanding at all. While the rest of the team keeps possession and tries to draw the opposition midfield out puyol rushes in like a bull in a chinashop and gives the ball away. Why cant he just stick to defending.
Abidal was lazy on the left and Real did a very effective job of keeping Xavi quiet. But really, they never had a chance once Barca started changing formation and moving players around. Messi moving to the centre had Ramos following him and pushed Metzelder out left throwing the defense into confusion.
Real look like an English club nowadays!!!
Barca look unstoppable!!

Anonymous said...

Every low or medium level team comes to us to defend. I dont care about their injuries, a RM should have tried to play some football. They have players to try so. A bit disappointing.

To said the truth: attacking more means gettin more :)
But they should have tried

I'm glad about the team performance, they wanted to win so much, they did great efforts, and they gained the 3points.

umessi10 said...

@Harsha
I absolutely agree mate.
We are infact, Mes que un club \m/

Anonymous said...

I didn't expect such a hard game. RM came to defend 90 mins.. It was one-way game. Ball possession 70%, much more goal chances and direct shots for Barca... But, if Drenthe scored it could've been much much more difficult for Barca. Thank God for VV's good form. Guardiola chose some wrong players such as Gudjohnsen. I wasn't impressed by him at all. Messi played his own game. He was selfish. I don't know...RM played with almost B team and FCB should've achieved greater victory. Who's to blame? I just hope it was because RM's 10 men defending.
FCB won and that's most important.

Anonymous said...

I like Ramzi's idea with moving Yaya forward next to Xavi and put Busquets into the DM role.

Maybe not in a strict way, something like a double-pivot, where at one time one of them is more advanced and in the next attack the other one.

Yaya has so much skill, it's awesome. What a goal whould that have been, had he had the space for a shot after his dribbling through their field.

kamikaze kontiki said...

I think another thing we need to do is stretch the defense on the left side. Ramzi, i guess in most your analysis so far you have considered Abidal as a third centre half, but wouldn't our attack be more effective if we had him getting forward a little more.
Messi is El Hijo de Dios, he has to do better in games where defenders are going to target him. And i agree that he kept blocking Alves's path keeping a defender with him. But for him to move to freely Henry HAS to start out from further out left. When the ball is close to the penalty area Henry should be far out left so as to stretch the defense.
As for Puyol, his defending is excellent. Even his positional sense has improved but every time he makes a run with the ball he wastes 10mins of passing and keeping position before that and wastes the space that was created for the midfielders to use.
The easy rotation of the 3 fwds provides 3 separate possible configurations in attack, enough to unlock any defense in the world.

Anonymous said...

Great read, Ramzi. I'd love to read a longer article about tactics, the complete tactical analysis... Thanks. :)

Anonymous said...

To be honest, I don't like reading Ramzi's analysis (just because I don't like). But this article is good, really good! Straight to the points. Thank you Ramzi.

I think Pep let Guddy in the starting line-up is reasonable, and then came Hleb or Busquets on the second half to replace him. That was how I expected, regardless of how well he plays in the first half. But I also expected a better performance from him.
During the game, I sensed that we'd score and that's what the story goes.

Great performance of the whole team, I love their victory hunger mind. Although we were too excited in the first half, lucky that didn't cost us thanks to Valdes' excellent saves!
The champion must also know to win this way.

Waleed said...

Getafe grabbed a 1-1 draw at camp nou,"and they dont even dream to have players like those RM own" and yet they came out sorry not to win!
RM played a 10-0-0 and yet they lost 2-0 and now they are celebrating that they only lost 2-0 !! :)) seeing this, I cant say anything but I really feel flattered.
I'm also happy that Eto'o missed that penalty because if he didn't some will say : well, you needed a penalty to win!!
and you now what seeing 21 players playing in their half most of the time was more humilating than the much demanded 5-0 for me, damn yes we are great!
and thank you Ramzi, you spoke every thing was going through my head after the game of in your lovely comment on that madrid blog. well said!

Anonymous said...

I think that Juande Ramos made a mistake as well as a brilliant idea playing some vital players against Zenit, but even though it helped them gain mentality they lost stamina and that showed at the end...but it also had to do with our fitness too...

Anonymous said...

pep this kinda off topic..but we need a search bar. I was looking for an article and had to sift through everything. mes que un club

Anonymous said...

...ramzi...i think that you talented even if i don't read your articles...too long and for me nothing new or just too much paper talk...but i think it must be said that abidals game was more than solid...i liked him from the beginning and want now to dedicate this words to him by saying that he was surely one of the best,not to say the best yesterday with a nearly 100% tackling rate...also valdes needs more respect as an own youth product who's a hundret times better option than any other highly-paid keeper...was very pleased with the game yesterday,with busquets,PUYOL,ALVES and also gudy a little...but i see that henry is still a shadow of himself even if he gives all...everywhere is written 'bout toure the best...but i think,with respect,that he has just a long way to become a player like vieira or others playing on the same position...know that the one or other is now thinking that i must be crazy...but that's my opinion...keep up the good work for those who need it or like it...ONE LOVE...BARCA FOREVER,hombres!!!!!...ramzi,don't be dumb and make money with your talent...the only way to take advantage of it...

Anonymous said...

great read ramzi...though i do prefer ur longer more extensive articles

pep said...

barca aficionado:

there's a search bar, but I guess you only have it when you have a google account. read more about that here:

http://fcbtransfers.blogspot.com/2008/10/how-to-follow-this-blog.html


You can also use the labels/tags, that you can find at the left (scroll down)

Ramzi said...

kamikaze kontiki: its not practical to ask Abidal to go forward, while Alves go forward and Yaya and sometimes even Puyol, will we keep only Marquez in the back? offense is a part of the game but balance is the key, the way to open the field most is as pep mentioned, having iniesta who open on the left flank to balance with Alves on the right.

jerryprez: More than welcomed.

Regarding the article size and analysis style, i am planning some changes but had to wait till after the December games, you may notice that and your opinion is always valued.

Waleed, I will drop another one there now lol

LéonDrágon: I will take my talent more seriously when I attract you to read ;)

Behold said...

Great article as always - thanks!

Waleed said...

when I read medridestas view of the match I have to go back and check the score sheet! as they are speaking as if they won 2-0!! it seems that we over estimated our rivals this time, as they were expecting us trashing them as we did with Valladolid! and any result below 5-0 is a victory for them. well, are we that terrifying?!! wow.
Ramzi, it seems that your friend from Real madrid talk still cant believe that they lost only with 2 goals! I have to say that I'm shocked with the level of ignorance these people carry! they just loss thier final chance to come back to competition and they're talking about spirit!! :)
one final note, if you managed to pack 11 players between the two posts and the cross bar for 90 min. ,wich is geometicrically possible i think, you still can achieve a draw and its legal after all, at least you dont have to play kung-fu to stop the opponents players!!

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