Yeap...Thats Getafe for Barcelona.... The devil's boys. They are from Madrid, Their players are loaned from or of Real madrid decency, Their fans taste like meringues and so as their board. Hell Getafe is the destination for Real Madrid whenever they want to recover from a psycological shoke of bad results, they go there for some luxurious time.
Best Memories
Worst Memories
The Guessing game
How will the starting lineup look like?
- I have an internal source who told me that Valdes will be the keeper. He refused to give any further details.
- The defense, and here we go with the "If statements":
1) If Alves started, then its Alves, Marquez, Pique, and Maxwell. Pep need to put his bet on the increasingly improving form of Marquez, while both Milito and Chegrnskiy need some more warm up.
2) If Alves didn’t start, then the defense will most probably be: Marquez, Milito, Pique, Maxwell. Three center backs with one offense oriented wing back (Maxwell). The same Puyol-Pique-Abidal + Alves ...kind of...
Why not the young options?
Because its scary to have inexperienced right back, with offense oriented left back and two relatively slow center backs in between.
Because if Getafe decided to put pressure on our defenders, I prefer to have a defense line that knows how to move the ball forward initiating offense. Rather than moving like headless chicken.
All that while excluding the possibility of starting Abidal, or else start whoever you want with him, he is all the defense we need.
- The midfield, depending on the defense:
1) If the defense was Alves, Marquez, Pique, and Maxwell, then Yaya will most probably be our holding midfielder (if he proved being in the right form in the training sessions). He is better acting as a Holding midfielder/third center back cover than Busquets. Which is needed to cover the offense movements of Alves and Maxwell. In front of him we can wish to have Keita and Xavi.
2) If the defense was Marquez, Milito, Pique, Maxwell, Then we can either have a Busquets-Keita-Xavi (favorable) or Busquets-Iniesta-Xavi. This way we take advantage of Busquets quality in the playmaking department and smoothing the offense build up in the midfield.
- Offense:
Messi and Ibra will most probably be starters. Between Iniesta, Henry, and Pedro its a close call. Yet:
- If we had Maxwell + Alves, then Henry is the best option. In fact he is the only option.
- If we didnt have the Maxwell + Alves and we had Keita in the midfield instead of Iniesta then either Pedro or Iniesta can serve better on the flank.
My favorite selection is:
Valdes, Alves, Marquez, Pique, Maxwell, Yaya, Keita, Xavi, Messi, Ibra and Henry.
Not a Preview that fits the known standards, but with lot of games to play and to avoid repetitive statements, I will have this kind of light previews with straight forward info most of the time. That will make the more analytic previews more interesting, when it’s done.
Finally
He score...He will not...He will score...He will not...He score...He will not...He will score...He will not...
Read More:
Half Season performance Poll, Vote!
Barcelona 2010, Tactical Ramble.
Who score goals for Barcelona?
From Ronaldinho to Ibra, Txiki in numbers
The Curse of Brilliance
Post-Laporta: Ibra, Marquez, or Chegrnskiy?
Waleed Said,
this game gave us much more than the 3 points:
-the return og the Marshal just in the right time.
-our new right back signing, he had a very convincing 1st half, while in the second half he followed Peps instructions to stick to deffensive duties, I hope Pep he'll be the 1st choice to sub Alves, not only an emergency plan because Puyol is absent.
-our counters becoming deadly, and i really like it.
-we are tough, really tough even when we are not playing our best match .
-and for the million time, this game proved that we have a genius on the bench.
now Madrid press can say all they want about the ref. bias in favor of barca!
Posted on February 6, 2010 at 2:20 PM
Waleed Said,
ouch, Alves out for 3 weeks, Toure for 15 days!
Posted on February 6, 2010 at 2:22 PM