It was the crunch match that a lot of people had been waiting for given the excellent record and form of Athletic Madrid. El tigre Falcao is in good form and the usual comparisons with Leo Messi have been flying around the press and the Internet.
The match started off as everybody expected and the two leaders of La Liga locked horns. Athletic had a game plan and they brought it to the Nou Camp.
Athletic Madrid was unbeatable for the first half hour of the match and everybody thought that Athletic would wait in their half and try to keep the ball. They made it a nightmare for Barca who had difficulty in passing the ball. They took out the Barca midfield thanks to a great job by Mario Suarez, Gabi and Koke. They went front side to side blocking and cutting out any passes and therefore made it very difficult for the Catalans. Arda Turan, Falcao and Diego Costa created danger whenever the occasion arose.
Falcao’s duel with Puyol was intense to say the least. One mistake by Barca and Falcao caused no end of problems. Costa took the ball from Messi in midfield, passed to Falcao who began a 40-yard sprint that ended with a subtle chip over an onrushing Victor Valdés.
Athletic Madrid started to push Barcelona out to the wings. Until then neither Pedro nor Alexis had tried up the flanks. The Chilean not once tried to outrun Juanfran on the flanks throughout the whole match. The Barca crowd started to sound the name of David Villa when he came out to warm up and it looks like Vilanova definitely does not have the same faith as he had in him before.
The wingers slowly began to reach Courtois’ area and Barca wanted to try it in numbers. Problems started to occur in Athletic’s marking of Barcelona. Adriano was left unmarked and made the visitors pay the high price. He picked up the ball just outside the box and made his way towards the centre only to let fly with a delicious left foot shot that curled inside the keeper’s post to his right. It was truly unstoppable.
Barca saw that the most direct way for a comeback was coming in from the left and Iniesta and Alba came to the rescue of Alexis who was finding the going tough. Barcelona began to play short balls, connect passes and run at the Athletic defense –they were starting to get into their groove.
One of the most electrifying moments of the first half was when Sergio Busquets pounced on a loose ball in the penalty area and with three nice touches and a feint stuck the ball into the roof of the net.
Simeone checked how much you have to work at the Camp Nou to accomplish nothing. Before the break still got the bad news from Filipe Luis’s injury. Cata Diaz took his place on the restart. Adriano ran same misfortune, which gave way after noticing a puncture in the thigh with five minutes left
Diego Simeone found out first hand the work-rate a team has to put in at the Nou Camp to accomplish anything and just before the half time whistle they got some bad news when Filipe Luis pulled up with a muscle strain. On came Cata Díaz in his place after the break. Adriano also had to be substituted on 84 minutes by Dani Alves with a similar injury.
In the second half, Falcao was kept at bay, while Messi made his entrance. When the Athletic Madrid defense crumbled and were all out of ideas Mess grabbed a brace to seal the match in style. The first, a beautiful left footed shot neatly tucked away into the corner and just out of reach of Courtois from just outside the box. The second was a cheeky mugging of the ball when Godínen tried to back pass the ball to another defender only to be robbed by a sharp Messi. He chipped the keeper and it was 4-1 to the Catalans.
The Barca fans went wild with euphoria knowing that most of the league has already been won with a 13 point gap over Real Madrid and 9 points over Athletic Madrid.
Mourinho and the entire Madrid should forget about the league as it is already for the Catalans. I hope this doesn’t mark the beginning of the end for the self aclaimed ”special one”. Long live Barca stars! Long live Barca!!!
Fantastic FCBARCA.