Valencia vs Barca Kings Cup [Spoiler Warning]

eZe^

Anybody watching this? Fantastic long range shot from Rubén Baraja. 1-0


Link to game;
http://www.rojadirecta.com/canal/psn-1.html

armour87

Was Baraja not one of the guys Koeman said would never play for the club again? Correct me if im wrong!

Do u have a link to commentary of the game?

KdjaCL

Its on sky in a while :mad:


kdjac

eZe^

armour87 wrote: »

Was Baraja not one of the guys Koeman said would never play for the club again? Correct me if im wrong!

Do u have a link to commentary of the game?

Nah, Im pretty sure it was only Angulo, Canizares and Albelda. I posted a link to the game if you want, nice foreign commentators for you!


Valencia are all over us, looks like the lack lustre Barca has showed up... balls.

armour87

Cheers 4 the link, thats brilliant!

Speaking of foreign commentators this is simply the greatest video on youtube, ever.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=3xbh9vTKKgc

eZe^

2-0 Mata, Barcelona will lose to Schalke if they play like this. FFS!


Its reminding me of the Gaspart era, sending shivers down my spine!

mike65

Barca are in tatters if Dr Sid Lowe can be belived.

Mike.

eZe^

mike65 wrote: »

Barca are in tatters if Dr Sid Lowe can be belived.

Mike.

Take that with a pinch of salt, he is the pundit/ commentator/ researcherr on Real Madrid Tv's. We will end up trophyless this season though.

Lets face it, if we were half decent opposition for Madrid we'd be pummelling them now. Arsenal have been on a run half as poor as Madrids in the league atm and look how the tide has turned.

We've become everything Madrid were four years ago, full of superstars who are not hungry anymore. The signing of Henry was great publicity but the majority of us knew it was a luxury buy. Henry himself is a very good player and his self motivation is not in question but the attitude of buying a 'name' to win our title back was Madrids policy, not ours.

It is sad to see but it is not unusual, only exceptional motivators can keep their team at the peak of their powers (Frank not being one of them) for years and even they dont keep the same squads. Alex Ferguson is a brilliant manager and while the decision to sell Beckham, Stam and van Nistelrooy may have been questionable at the time but it has kept players on their toes. No one should be invincible. In the case of Barca however there are names before performances.

As many have said it is the end of a cycle. We need to build around a backbone of Puyol, Messi, Toure and Iniesta. Let someone pay over the odds for our superstars. Its their policy, not ours.

applehunter

eZe^ wrote: »

Take that with a pinch of salt, he is the pundit/ commentator/ researcherr on Real Madrid Tv's. We will end up trophyless this season though.

Lets face it, if we were half decent opposition for Madrid we'd be pummelling them now. Arsenal have been on a run half as poor as Madrids in the league atm and look how the tide has turned.

We've become everything Madrid were four years ago, full of superstars who are not hungry anymore. The signing of Henry was great publicity but the majority of us knew it was a luxury buy. Henry himself is a very good player and his self motivation is not in question but the attitude of buying a 'name' to win our title back was Madrids policy, not ours.

It is sad to see but it is not unusual, only exceptional motivators can keep their team at the peak of their powers (Frank not being one of them) for years and even they dont keep the same squads. Alex Ferguson is a brilliant manager and while the decision to sell Beckham, Stam and van Nistelrooy may have been questionable at the time but it has kept players on their toes. No one should be invincible. In the case of Barca however there are names before performances.

As many have said it is the end of a cycle. We need to build around a backbone of Puyol, Messi, Toure and Iniesta. Let someone pay over the odds for our superstars. Its their policy, not ours.

Good post.

armour87

Is Toure good enough?

Eze, how u get that barca fan in the sig?

eZe^

Toure is a solid DM, our best signing in the summer for sure. He is carrying a knock atm though, he was meant to be out for at least 3 weeks.

I just found this image and pasted the link in between [*img][*/img]. (without the stars)

Tusky

Is it on tv ?

eZe^

Tusky wrote: »

Is it on tv ?

Itll be on sky at 10. Dont bother watching it, unless youre a valencia fan. Haha.

Tusky

eZe^ wrote: »

Itll be on sky at 10. Dont bother watching it, unless youre a valencia fan. Haha.

I'm a neutral. I like both teams though!

eZe^

2-1 Henry, with a header... Game on for last 20 mins.


Edit- ROFL, literally 15 seconds later, Valencia score again...

3-1 comical sunday league defending.

eZe^

3-2 Etoo, hahah, if Barca's defenders didnt play like they had a disability they'd be in the final.

An Citeog

eZe^ wrote: »

As many have said it is the end of a cycle. We need to build around a backbone of Puyol, Messi, Toure and Iniesta. Let someone pay over the odds for our superstars. Its their policy, not ours.

Whatever about the other 3, Puyol will be 30 in April. He's been a brilliant servant for Barça but hasn't shown the form he did a couple of seasons ago. Defensively Barça aren't the strongest. They've impulsive players like Puyol, Milito and Marquez, all of whom tend to dive into a tackle. Valdes, aswell, is a very good shot-stopper but the rest of his game isn't the best imho.

Everybody knows how good Messi is and my favourite player by far on the Barça team is Iniesta. My next Barça jersey will have his name on the back!:)

Touré has been very impressive aswell this season and I only see him getting better. I don't see Rijkaard there next season though but have no idea who'll take over. Maybe Schuster!:p

Anyway, looks like the Champions League is all Barça have left to play for and tbh, I don't see them winning that.

eZe^

The worst thing is that Puyol, Marquez, Thuram, Abidal, Zambrotta and Milito are all actually quite good defenders. Its just it seems they dont know how to defend set pieces and crosses, which also means they very very very rarely score headers iswell.



Its something that they just have to work on in training, but it seems the coach is incompetent, any set of players regardless of how skillful they are can be thought how to be defend set pieces and incoming headers, theres no excuse for players like Thuram, Milito and Puyol being ****e in the air, all it will take is a solid coach teaching them a couple of hours a day. Oh, and for the record, I never remember barca having a top quality keeper so theres nothing new there..


Perhaps it is finally time for Frank to leave at the end of this season, it seems he can no longer motivate the players. I wonder who will replace him, rumours are saying Mourinho, Lippi or even Laudrup, but Id take it all with a pinch of salt. Schuster can f*ck off.

cournioni

eZe^ wrote: »

The worst thing is that Puyol, Marquez, Thuram, Abidal, Zambrotta and Milito are all actually quite good defenders. Its just it seems they dont know how to defend set pieces and crosses, which also means they very very very rarely score headers iswell.

Well the one thing that I notice straight away about Barca's defence is that they are all very small, the central defenders especially...

Milito - 5'10"
Marquez - 5'11"
Puyol - 5'10"
Zambrotta - 5'11.5"
Sylvinho - 5'8"
Thuram - 5'11.5"
Abidal - 6'1"
Oleguer - 6'1.5"

That is a very very small back line to have and is always going to be under threat from set pieces from most teams. Add that to the fact that Valdes isn't the best lad to deal with a cross and you have big problems...