El Clásico: the biggest club match on the planet

Raskolnikov

2-0 messi.

allybhoy

2nill, Messi, lovely counter attack and finish, who minced the post out of it? Cannavaro ? Looked sore!

ironingbored

Great goal! Messi

el rabitos

awesome. good game. dull 2nd half in general. very good 1st half. was always going to be a gritty goal that broke the deadlock. woot :pac:

Raskolnikov

That's La Liga wrapped up for Barcelona.

BFassassin

Excellent start and finish to the game. Real did well until the last 15 mins though.

dfx-

Real got what their Stoke City approach deserved, imo.

Raskolnikov

Even though he didn't score, I have to say that Henry was excellent tonight.

Ardent

Brilliant game. Great finish to it. What a finish by Messi at the end. As already said, that's the league sewn up for Barca. Best club in the world at this moment in time.

Feel sorry for Casilllas, he didn't deserve to end up on the losing team.

redout

The result is hardly surprising. The better team won and deservedly so. Leo Messi put on another great performance, best player on the planet. His finish for the second was simply exquisite. The only way Madrid new how to deal with him was to kick him all night.

Barca are now 8 points clear at the top and 12 ahead of Real Madrid. Madrid's title hopes are now all but gone. Only a fool would bet against Barca at this stage. Casillas showed some good form tonight for the first time in about two months. He was the reason why Madrid only lost by two.

Sneijder playing was a mistake on Ramos part. The guy only trained yesterday for the first time. I was not at all surprised to see him leave the pitch after only half an hour. Madrid put up a decent fight but Barca's class shone through in the end.

An Citeog

redout wrote: »

The result is hardly surprising. The better team won and deservedly so. Leo Messi put on another great performance, best player on the planet. His finish for the second was simply exquisite. The only way Madrid new how to deal with him was to kick him all night.

Barca are now 8 points clear at the top and 12 ahead of Real Madrid. Madrid's title hopes are now all but gone. Only a fool would bet against Barca at this stage. Casillas showed some good form tonight for the first time in about two months. He was the reason why Madrid only lost by two.

Sneijder playing was a mistake on Ramos part. The guy only trained yesterday for the first time. I was not at all surprised to see him leave the pitch after only half an hour. Madrid put up a decent fight but Barca's class shone through in the end.

Tbh, apart from the opening 15 minutes and his finish, I thought he was fairly poor. Yeah, he did get kicked but it's something he has to learn to deal with. If he'd stayed on the wing, that Madrid defence wouldn't have looked half as impressive. He just ended up playing into their hands.

Raskolnikov

redout wrote: »

Sneijder playing was a mistake on Ramos part.

To be honest, that's the problem for Real Madrid. Sneijder is a decent player, but he's nowhere near Messi's league. The same goes for the like of Drenthe and Higuaín. Decent players, but they're never going to set the world alight.

Ronan|Raven

Anyteam that can have a front three of Henry, Eto'd and Messi are seriously blessed.

Bubs101

Raskolnikov wrote: »

To be honest, that's the problem for Real Madrid. Sneijder is a decent player, but he's nowhere near Messi's league. The same goes for the like of Drenthe and Higuaín. Decent players, but they're never going to set the world alight.

From what i've seen and heard Higuain has developled into quite the player.

An Citeog

Bubs101 wrote: »

From what i've seen and heard Higuain has developled into quite the player.

He's been Madrid's best player this season imo. Not hard though, seeing as they've been shíte!:p

Keith186

Ardent wrote: »

Feel sorry for Casilllas, he didn't deserve to end up on the losing team.

He was unlucky with Messi's goal too. If he didn't get a touch to it I think Cannavaro would have got to the ball in time. Casillas is a top notch keeper, I'd porbably rate him above Buffon although I don't get to see much of Juve anymore.

Barring a couple of nasty injuries to key players Barca should run away with this and are on course to score the most goals ever in a season.

Think they're on 50 now after 15 games!

Record is held by R Madrid, 107 I think back when they had a legendary team, like Barca have now:D

eZe^

Got in from my mates 21st at 4am so didn't have time to post here.

Firstly I think it's important to give credit where credit is due, Ramos had Madrid playing the perfect tactics for 80 minutes, and this may sound weird, but I don't think they would have played as well if they had more first teamers present. Everyone playing was really trying to prove themselves in the white of Madrid, unfortunately they just came up against a better team.

Now to Barca;

YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

TWOOOOO NILL!!!!

El capitan was man of the match, the amount of people that bash that guy when imo he consistently proves himself to be one of the best CB's in the world, he was just excellent last night. Same can be said for Valdes, he was excellent and has been excellent for months now, he is only behind the likes of Casillas and Buffon in my books, definitely good enough for a championship winnig sie. Marquez dealt with everything thrown at him very well too.

Toure bossed midfield, he really is the perfect DMF for a possession orientated football team, he may not be as menacing or as good in the tackle as someone like Mascherano, but he reads the game excellently, and intercepts and dispossesses the other team perfectly. Plus he has the burst of pace and a that little bit skill to make runs into the box and take on a shot. Plus his passing is excellent, probably the best DMF at passing (along with De Rossi) in the world right now.

Eto'o looked **** all evening, missed his penalty and STILL ended up winning the game for us. Hallmark of a great striker, I don't think there is a better striker in the world at the moment. Henry was actually brilliant, the best out of the front three for sure, some of his passing (assist for Messi) and all round game has really started to shine through, I bet Arsenal fans aren't so smug about him leaving now. :pac:

Eidur was actually quite good in the first half, but was totally anonymous the second, that's kind of why I would have preferred Busquets, not only would Busquets and Toure nullify Guti (Madrid's only outlet for goals really) but it would allow Eidur to come off the bench and make the impact he is most effective at doing.

Messi had a mediocre game, I thought he dealt well with the abuse for the first 25 minutes, but evenutally he died out of the game a little. He took his goal well, so what more can we ask of him, he's scoring and assisting for fun, I don't think anyone can expect him to be playing unbelievably in every single game. Even though he may have been at his most effective offensively if he stayed on the left, I thought Guardiola showed alot of intelligence to have him continually switch positions, this confused the **** out of Ramos and Salgado and thus weakened their defense even more.


I really think Pep is the Jose Mourinho of possession sides, he has blended and effective and dogged Italian style defense with the dutch creative attack. He is young, intelligent, commands respect, down to earth and he lives and breaths this club. Even if we were to capitulate and lose every competition before the end of the season, there is no manager I'd rather have at the helm.

Bubs101

eZe^ wrote: »

I really think Pep is the Jose Mourinho of possession sides, he has blended and effective and dogged Italian style defense with the dutch creative attack. He is young, intelligent, commands respect, down to earth and he lives and breaths this club. Even if we were to capitulate and lose every competition before the end of the season, there is no manager I'd rather have at the helm.

His time at Brescia really seems to have benefited him managerially as in he's experienced trying to dominate and survive as a players and has managed to combine both in Barca's tactics

I'm still heavily under the influence of alcohol so to avoid embarassing myself I'll keep it short!

Both GKs were brilliant. Casillas is the best in the world and Valdes is so under rated its not funny.

Messi is the Godfather!

Great resuly but I was hoping for a hammering. That said, Ramos set them up not to lose and was doing aa damn good job of it.


Madrids MOTM was definitely Casillas, he's just amazing. No other word for it.


Barca had many candidates but Id agree with eZe that Puyol really stood out, he really stood up and lead the team last night.

eZe^

Bubs101 wrote: »

His time at Brescia really seems to have benefited him managerially as in he's experienced trying to dominate and survive as a players and has managed to combine both in Barca's tactics

Didn't he only play like 20 games for Brescia? Was he a key player for them?


I just watched the whole game on sky plus there again, I take it back, Hleb's through pass to Henry before Messi scored was the best pass of the night. Absolutely beautiful.

Bubs101

eZe^ wrote: »

Didn't he only play like 20 games for Brescia? Was he a key player for them?

.

I could be very wrong here but he was key at the beginning of the season and played really really well. Brescia were massive surprises in the league and had baggio and Toni up front and then I think he failed a drugs test and they slipped down the league

What I meant by his spell at Brescia would do him good is that unlike previous coaches, Rijkard for example, Guardiola has experience at a great club who played free flowing football and at a club who had to grind out points in a Bolton-esque way

eZe^

I know what you mean, and you can see that he has instilled a thorough work ethic in the team now, and it means they are even more effective. Guardiola is my favourite player of all time, he was a pure footballing brain and was an example to players that you don't need to be pacey to be a fantastic player. I loved him as a kid.

Bubs101

eZe^ wrote: »

I know what you mean, and you can see that he has instilled a thorough work ethic in the team now, and it means they are even more effective.

Think that is something he may have gotten from Brescia. They were a really close team who at the time were thought to have no really outstanding players bar their forwards (they had Hubner as well for a while) yet the sum of their parts was so much stronger than the team itself and they always looked like they had fun. They were effectively a Hull who did it 3 times in a row

eagle eye

I watched the match last night and the one thing that was confirmed for me was the Casillas is by far and away the best goalkeeper in the world. I know he got caught out with the lob from Messi at the very end but only for him Real Madrid would have been at least three behind a lot earlier in the game. He was my Man of the Match.

SantryRed

Buffon is still better than Casillas lads.

An Citeog

SantryRed wrote: »

Buffon is still better than Casillas lads.

It's debatable tbh, especially Casillas' form last season. What is true though, is that both Casillas and Buffon are a class above any other keeper in the world.

SantryRed

Too right, Cech used to be in there until his head injury.

Now there's only two of them.

Bubs101

An Citeog wrote: »

It's debatable tbh, especially Casillas' form last season. What is true though, is that both Casillas and Buffon are a class above any other keeper in the world.

They're equals. Last year Buffon had such a shambolic defense to deal with that the figures don't do his performance justice, this season he has been injured all year more or less and the season before he was in Serie B, which is incomperable to La Liga and the only real comperable year was the one before that and that's before Casillas got that good. Both matches they've faced off against each other they've drawed

UnitedIrishman

Casillas is still the best for me and always was. I remember 3-4 years ago when Madrid were challenging Barca for the title with possibly the worst defence I've ever seen them have. It was a case of Casillas vs. the Attack and hope Raul and co. could carry them up front. He made save after save despite the likes of Carlos, Helguera and Salgado making cock ups.

His performance last night almost deserved a point in itself.

redout

eZe^ wrote: »

Got in from my mates 21st at 4am so didn't have time to post here.






Messi had a mediocre game,

.

You sure you were still not sloshed when you wrote that ? The guy had a good game without doubt. There was a sense of panic in the Madrid defence every time he had the ball. In the second half he was quiter granted but still played better than most out there. If he had of been kept out on the right he would have ended up leaving the Nou camp in the back of a ambulance.

All the Madrid players done was kick the chap all night. He completed at least 90% of his runs and got the pass away. Now most times the attack broke down soon afterwards but hardly of Messi's doing. He done his job in my opinion and took his goal with panache. The only player Marca rated higher than him in todays paper was Puyol with a 9. They gave Messi and Valdes 8 and the rest 6's and 7's. Just my opinion but I think mediocre is a bad choice of words.

eirebhoy

Raskolnikov wrote: »

To be honest, that's the problem for Real Madrid. Sneijder is a decent player, but he's nowhere near Messi's league. The same goes for the like of Drenthe and Higuaín. Decent players, but they're never going to set the world alight.

Sneijder's class imo. No Messi but who is? Park, Fletcher, O'Shea and others get regular game time for United. Real have the players.

gimmick

I only kind of saw the game, but am delighted with the result. It looked like Barca were going to destroy Real in the early going, but they weathered the storm brilliantly.

It was a great birthday present! Thought the game was up when Eto'o missed the spotter though. Wish I had sky plus so I can watch again, but will have to wait for the superlatives on revista.

Idu

UnitedIrishman wrote: »

Casillas is still the best for me and always was. I remember 3-4 years ago when Madrid were challenging Barca for the title with possibly the worst defence I've ever seen them have. It was a case of Casillas vs. the Attack and hope Raul and co. could carry them up front. He made save after save despite the likes of Carlos, Helguera and Salgado making cock ups.

His performance last night almost deserved a point in itself.

Two years in a row Casillas was the most shot at keeper, made the most saves and conceaded the least in the Spanish league. The guy is a god of a keeper

An Citeog

Just listening to Ballague trying to downplay Madrid's obvious targetting of Messi in the first half. According to him, Messi shouldn't be dropping back into the middle of the pitch to win the ball. Tbh, I thought it was disgraceful. It's no coincidence either the amount of times he was raked down the achilles!

eZe^

Sid Lowe made an excellent point on the harsh challenges. Seeing as referees give players one or two warnings before showing them a yellow, teams employ the tactic of 'each player gets one tackle in on Messi so no one person has to do all the dirty work and get booked'. Sid Lowe suggested that referees book say the third person who deliberately fowls him, regardless of how many fowls that person has committed, that way eliminating the dirty rotation of tackles on a single player.