Barcelona: Charged with corruption .... again!

B. Munich

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Barcelona looked good in the first half and if they had scored nobody could have complained. Normally Lewandowski at least buries one of his chances. However, he got a history to just bottle these in the huge games.

On the other hand Bayern was far from their best. After 3 draws in a row in the Bundesliga, 2 of them at home the team was pretty low in confidence. There was no fluidity in the attacks and I can't remember of a first half Bayern lost the ball so often and misplaced so many passes. Our attaching moves and play looked very labored and over complicated. Several players are far from their best. Especially Mané looked totally out of place.
I believe it's mostly on Nagelsmann who rotated too much. It's fine to do this once the team has gelled and the automatisms work. For now he should let his best 11 play and gel together. There is a lot of space for improvements.
 

Ragnar123

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Gavi will renew his contract tomorrow :drool: :drool: :drool:

Pedri and Gavi will be our next Xavi and Iniesta. Now we need a replacement for Busquets. A shame that Frenkie can't play the only pivot and has other strengths.
 

Raiden Shogun

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Gavi will renew his contract tomorrow :drool: :drool: :drool:

Pedri and Gavi will be our next Xavi and Iniesta. Now we need a replacement for Busquets. A shame that Frenkie can't play the only pivot and has other strengths.
I believe Frenkie could change his game and play that role with more tactical and positional discipline. He'll for sure get his chances as the season progresses and grandpa Busi needs to rest more.

As for Pedri and Gavi, what a duo! Relieved Gavi is renewing, we hit the jackpot with those 2.
 

Niemans

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Gavi will renew his contract tomorrow :drool: :drool: :drool:

Pedri and Gavi will be our next Xavi and Iniesta. Now we need a replacement for Busquets. A shame that Frenkie can't play the only pivot and has other strengths.
There are a couple of players in the academy with good projection for Busquets' position.
We'll see how they develop physically.
 

Acrobat7

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There are a couple of players in the academy with good projection for Busquets' position.
We'll see how they develop physically.
You need a Kimmich, we (Bayern) need a Pedri.
 

caid

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Barcelona looked good in the first half and if they had scored nobody could have complained. Normally Lewandowski at least buries one of his chances. However, he got a history to just bottle these in the huge games.

On the other hand Bayern was far from their best. After 3 draws in a row in the Bundesliga, 2 of them at home the team was pretty low in confidence. There was no fluidity in the attacks and I can't remember of a first half Bayern lost the ball so often and misplaced so many passes. Our attaching moves and play looked very labored and over complicated. Several players are far from their best. Especially Mané looked totally out of place.
I believe it's mostly on Nagelsmann who rotated too much. It's fine to do this once the team has gelled and the automatisms work. For now he should let his best 11 play and gel together. There is a lot of space for improvements.
I thought both teams looked disjointed. Pedri ran the match and was excellent but their forwards were really poor. Just poor choices badly executed. Wasteful and aimless. Thought the penalty was an obvious dive. Thought their defence looked like it could be got at and would concede from minimal chances. Dont think any of their formations or selections looked 'right'.
Bayern had issues too, their midfield wasn't in the match at all first half and their forwards weren't combining at all. The lack of a striker and a focus to play around looked very obvious. They mostly looked like they hadn't kicked into gear rather than the structural weaknesses that Barca had though.
Think both teams will need to be much better to go far.
 

CruyffMaradonaMessi

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Barcelona looked good in the first half and if they had scored nobody could have complained. Normally Lewandowski at least buries one of his chances. However, he got a history to just bottle these in the huge games.

On the other hand Bayern was far from their best. After 3 draws in a row in the Bundesliga, 2 of them at home the team was pretty low in confidence. There was no fluidity in the attacks and I can't remember of a first half Bayern lost the ball so often and misplaced so many passes. Our attaching moves and play looked very labored and over complicated. Several players are far from their best. Especially Mané looked totally out of place.
I believe it's mostly on Nagelsmann who rotated too much. It's fine to do this once the team has gelled and the automatisms work. For now he should let his best 11 play and gel together. There is a lot of space for improvements.
It makes no sense to even compare current Barça with current Bayern. Barça is a team under construction with a new manager (Xavi) and a newly initiated project that has undergone a huge squad change while Bayern is mostly a "made" team already. Not to mention that the past 3 years (until now and hopefully no longer the case after this season) have been the worst in the history of Barça in the past almost 20 years after an enormously successful 15 year long period (2004-2019) for the club that resulted in 10 league titles (during a time when the La Liga was the best league in the world which was also backed up by the UEFA coefficient list), 4 CL, 7 Copa del Rey, 8 Spanish Super Cup, 3 European Super Cup and 3 FIFA Club World Cups titles. We should have won even more during that period but that is another discussion altogether. Most recently 2018-19 was the easiest path to the third treble in 10 years. Would have been something truly historic but then came Liverpool (LOL) and we collapsed even against Valencia in the Copa del Rey final as a consequence. I still have PTSD from that match more than any other match. I take solace in the fact that Klopp's Liverpool have only managed to win 1 league title and 1 CL title in 7 years for all the talk of their "historical" team. Serves those b******* well.

We have about 6 or 7 players that were part of the 2019-2020 season squad left in today's squad. Only ter Stegen, Busquets, Fati (Fati was a 16-17 year old kid during the 2019-20 season - not to mention his numerous injuries that combined made him unavailable for close to 2 years, a crime for such a huge talent), Dembélé (similar case was more injured than ready to play), FDJ (now not even a guaranteed starter, 18 year old Gavi is clearly preferred by Xavi) are relevant for Xavi nowadays. Araújo played 6 games during the 2019-20 season and was thus a marginal player. Roberto is a marginal player currently too. Similarly to the two remaining "vacas sagradas" in Piqué and Alba. Rest are completely new players.

All that in one of the most turbulent institutional crisis in the club's history (Bartomeu's sabotage of the club and the utter and complete mess he left for Laporta to fix, not different from another catastrophic president, Gaspart, that left a similar mess to Laporta back in 2003), COVID-19 and related economic problems and probably most importantly the by far greatest servant of the club (MessI) and arguably the greatest footballer ever, leaving the club.

I literally had zero expectations for the team before this season began, before the impressive job that Laporta, Alemany and the rest did this summer. The performances this season so far and the talented and most importantly very young squad, gives reasons to be optimistic for the first time in quite some time. I think that we can win the league but CL is a bit too soon IMO and we rarely if ever had any marginals or luck in that tournament anyway, always having to be the best team in Europe to win it, hence why we always won the league title when we won the CL.

Anyway it is typical Barça of the latest years (in fact suspect defending was always our thing) to concede an absurd goal (Bayern's first goal was a joke, should never have occurred, what was the defense doing and most importantly ter Stegen who continues to struggle whenever he has to collect crosses, IMO despite a good start he remains a mental midget and a liability if you ask me, if we had Courtois or Neuer in goal yesterday we would not have lost against you lot) later just to concede another goal a few minutes later due to being "shocked". No matter how bad the likes of say RM would have played, such a thing rarely happens for them.
The mental element seems to have been completely neglected by the club for years until now. Hopefully serial winners like Lewandowski can help install a culture of dedication, professionalism, mental fortitude etc. that has been lacking for years. Clearly our veterans like Piqué, Alba and others have failed in this regard hugely.

Gavi will renew his contract tomorrow :drool: :drool: :drool:

Pedri and Gavi will be our next Xavi and Iniesta. Now we need a replacement for Busquets. A shame that Frenkie can't play the only pivot and has other strengths.
While Pedri and Gavi are great, I fear that they are too "lightweight" in today's very athletic and fast-paced football but I and many others also had our doubts about Xavi and Don Andrés for both club and country (Spain) but they probably turned into the most successful midfield pairing in football history.

Anyway I don't like those comparisons, it will be impossible (IMO) to equal Xavi and Iniesta.

As for replacements of Busquets, I fear that the board and fans will demand a carbon copy of Busquets when that won't be possible or likely either.

I would like a profile with similar characteristics as Tchouaméni (in particular the physical element) and ideally a quick DM. Quite tired (been the case for years) of Busquets losing possession 2-3 times each game against good opponents because of his legs failing him.

It is why I don't like the rumors of Zubimendi. While talented he seems a bit too "lightweight" as well.

I would love an early Yaya Touré profile as during the 2008-9 season.

For now I am curious to see how Kessié would perform in Busquets role but I don't see him as a lone DM in our system.

As for FDJ, I feel that he was never a lone DM to begin with. I think that we will try to get rid of him next summer. It all depends on how he and the team will perform this season.
 
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Pickle85

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Not sure if serious? 33 fencing titles? Chess? If we include such sports and individual sports as a whole Barça remains the sports club with the most European titles and the most titles that are the equivalent of the CL.

Take our athletics sections with several active Olympic champions and the amateur sports. Barça has 1 Club World Cup in beach soccer (equivalent of the CL in this sport) on top of my head.

Overall, with all due respect, CSKA is not in the same stratosphere as Barça.



Yes, Barça is unique by being the most successful sports club in Europe if all sports are combined. I would claim that it is a quite unique achievement to have won the equivalent of the CL in all of your professional sports sections. Whatever your local village club is, I doubt that they can compare in this regard. No club in Europe can. This is a factual statement, not just opinion.



No offense but you can’t be from Spain or a Spaniard when writing such an ignorant post. Hence your iimited knowledge of the topics at hand and lack of access to primary literature in Spanish. What you wrote is pure nonsense.

The di Stéfano case has been widely covered and it has been proven beyond any doubt that foul play did occur and that he was literally stolen from the nose of Barça who signed him first. In fact Di Stéfano played his first matches in Spain in a Barça shirt. There are photos and footage of this. Nor did Barça ever agree to him leaving for RM.

RM has always been the state-supported/sponsored club and always enjoyed favorable referring decisions (incomparable to those of Barça) and most of the media control to create narratives and put pressure on referees and the local football discourse. We see this to this very day. I talked about the joke that is El Chiringuito de Jugones and that it might as well be called Real Madrid Televisión. It has always been that way.

RM will always be closely associated with the Franco regime as will Santiago Bernabeú (a well-known and public fascist bigot whose open anti-Catalan sentiments are well-known and widely covered). Franco was not interested in football to begin with but the Franco regime clearly used RM as a vehicle for international exposure for the country and as such favored it and looked the other way whenever there were any "obstacles". It did not hurt that RM were seen as a “pure” Spanish team and not located in the many historically autonomous communities (Catalan, Basque, Galician etc.).

Not much different from the time of Sanz when the club was close to bankruptcy but suddenly under Florentino managed to sell land for an inflated price and under dubious circumstances and the whole Figo transfer (bank guarantee at a time of great economic crisis - no levers!). Basically nothing will change the fact that RM has been and remains the club of the establishment to this very day. The same Florentino controls much of the sports media in the country. Ever wondered why there are hardly ever any leaks coming out from RM (other than the famous Florentino tapes during the Covid-19 crisis which were 20-10 years old) while this constantly occurs for Barça? Gerard Romero said it very well this summer, in BCN the local journalists report what they want to, in Madrid most of the journalists are in the pockets of Florentino and only report what he tells them to report.

You guys literally won 2 CL finals (and God's know how many European Cup/CL titles due to refereeing decisions going your way - not to mention the first 5 were tinpot European Cups compared to later tournaments - the whole early history of the European Cup and the involvement of Santiago Bernábeu and RM is another topic altogether) due to wrongly allowed offside goals (1998, 2017) on top of my head so this "UEFAlona" nonsense is what it is. There is no top club in Europe that has had so many favorable refereeing decisions and outright luck than RM. We saw it last season once again. But for your lot this is normal so you get very upset when somebody points the obvious out.

Here is your "clean" RM history.

I cannot post Youtube links yet, but write "Real Madrid-TV3:La leyenda negra de la gloria blanca, la gran estafa de Franco. SUBT. ESPAÑOL CC".

As for Franco being anti-royal, it has to be one of the worst jokes out there. The same Franco made Spain a kingdom shortly after the end of the Spanish Civil War and personally appointed a successor (Juan Carlos I) years before he died. Nice try, though. However Franco was a well-known anti-Catalan bigot whose regime forbade and actively combated Catalan language, Catalan identity and Catalan culture but you "curiously" forgot to mention all of that as if the world is ignorant of those historical facts.



Which is why FC Barcelona is the most followed sports club in the world across all social media and arguably the club that has had the most iconic football players in its history. On the other hand who genuinely likes or even respects Chelsea other than Chelsea fans? Tinpot club only made relevant by a criminal Russian oligarch some 19 years ago. No offense.



As for Luka Doncic, he never destroyed European basketball, he won 1 Euroleague in 3 seasons. Great Slovenian player though.

Anyway Pau Gasol > Doncic.

Marketing plot? Are you joking? It was first used in January 1968 by Narcís de Carreras after he was elected as president. Franco died in November of 1975.

https://blogs.20minutos.es/yaestael...el-eslogan-mes-que-un-club-del-f-c-barcelona/

It was a clear reference to the Franco fascist dictatorship and its well-known oppression of Catalan culture, language etc. Hence "més que un club" having a political origin more than anything (hence my initial comments about Catalanism) which must be understood in the context of the Franco regime (1968). Narcís de Carreras later claimed that it was also a reference to the multiple sports sections of Barça (Barça not just being a football club only) that ironically became enormously successful AFTER Franco's death.

As I already wrote, later this slogan (which is just that, a slogan) was used to explain the overall club values and the playing style of offensive possession based football.
TLDR
 

#00F

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There are a couple of players in the academy with good projection for Busquets' position.
We'll see how they develop physically.
What about Nico? How is he doing now?
 

Buckie

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Pedri and Gavi will be our next Xavi and Iniesta. Now we need a replacement for Busquets. A shame that Frenkie can't play the only pivot and has other strengths.
Very small chance they turn out to be as good as Xavi and Iniesta. Players like that don't come around very often.
 

GinobiliTheGOAT

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They did very well vs Bayern, even more impressive considering it was away from home. They are serious squad now, won't be surprised if they win League title.

Pedri is just gold, what a player. Barca have all the pieces in place, maybe couple of good FBs short (Kounde is good but need better attacking FB).
Well said
 

kthanksbye

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It actually was, Barca was definetely the stronger team in the first half, if not for the chance wasting and VAR being asleep I could have seen them walk away with at least a point yesterday, but hey finishing is part of playing football if you can't do it, you can't win. Pedri was amazing yesterday once again, can't believe the kid is only 19, imo he is already one of the top 5 attack minded midfielders in the world right now.
Yes, that's why the result doesn't bother me, a 19 yr old will start converting those chances, Raphina will not keep shooting wide if he keeps getting into those positions, Lewa is scoring that chance 9 times out of 10, he very uncharacteristically snatched at it, Dembele is getting that pen in any other game.

The team is lookin solid, never devoid of creating chances, excited to see what this bunch can develop into under Xavi.
 

CruyffMaradonaMessi

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The team will have a absolutely brutal schedule for the entire next month.

Mallorca (away), Inter (away), Celta (home), Inter (home), RM (away), Villarreal (home), Athletic (home), Bayern (home) and Valencia (away). Almost a game every 3 days.

I don’t recall such a brutal schedule for anyone given month in recent memory and all that while being a team under construction.

The next month will IMO define how we will do this season. It is basically make or break. At least as far as the league goes. The quality of La Liga nowadays (last few seasons) have been way worse than it was not long ago for obvious reasons. You can’t expect RM to drop many points in the league if they first get a substantial lead. So a good league start point wise is absolutely crucial as usual.

Ideally, for a team under construction, you would have preferred such a brutal schedule to have been placed later in the season when the team has yelled more but that is the randomness of football and in particular the CL.
 
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Acrobat7

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The team will have a absolutely brutal schedule for the entire next month.

Mallorca (away), Inter (away), Celta (home), Inter (home), RM (away), Villarreal (home), Athletic (home), Bayern (home) and Valencia (away). Almost a game every 3 days.

I don’t recall such a brutal schedule for anyone given month in recent memory and all that while being a team under construction.
Once again, this is proof of a very clear conspiracy against Barca. Lever in the history of the world has a team had so many difficult games in such a short amount of time. Everyone is against poor Barca. Terribly unfair.
 

Dave Smith

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Can't wait for the Inter games. If Inter can do them once and then get the draw in the other match it'll be back to the Ropey for them and Laporta will have to pull another Lever.
 

Blackwidow

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The team will have a absolutely brutal schedule for the entire next month.

Mallorca (away), Inter (away), Celta (home), Inter (home), RM (away), Villarreal (home), Athletic (home), Bayern (home) and Valencia (away). Almost a game every 3 days.

I don’t recall such a brutal schedule for anyone given month in recent memory and all that while being a team under construction.

The next month will IMO define how we will do this season. It is basically make or break. At least as far as the league goes. The quality of La Liga nowadays (last few seasons) have been way worse than it was not long ago for obvious reasons. You can’t expect RM to drop many points in the league if they first get a substantial lead. So a good league start point wise is absolutely crucial as usual.

Ideally, for a team under construction, you would have preferred such a brutal schedule to have been placed later in the season when the team has yelled more but that is the randomness of football and in particular the CL.
Not so much travelling, or? Mallorca is about the nearest away ground outside of Barcelona - Milan is a 90 minutes flight. then two home matches, away to Madrid, then 3 home matches and Valencia.

All the national home matches and the Mallorca match should not be tough tasks either. All of the teams with international matches have 2 matches a week until the World Cup...
 

Acrobat7

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Not so much travelling, or? Mallorca is about the nearest away ground outside of Barcelona - Milan is a 90 minutes flight. then two home matches, away to Madrid, then 3 home matches and Valencia.

All the national home matches and the Mallorca match should not be tough tasks either. All of the teams with international matches have 2 matches a week until the World Cup...
No, you're wrong. It's a horrendously difficult schedule against only immensely strong opponents who all require super leveraborious travel.
 

CruyffMaradonaMessi

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Once again, this is proof of a very clear conspiracy against Barca. Lever in the history of the world has a team had so many difficult games in such a short amount of time. Everyone is against poor Barca. Terribly unfair.
What is the matter with you, did you swallow some sauerkraut or a Frankfurter? I understand that Bayern fans are not used to such a schedule as your team spends most of its existence in a secondary farmers league by large. Yes, those Frankfurters had their few seconds of glory last year against a historically poor Barça team but even a blind hen can also find grain once in a while.

Anyway your continuous presence in this thread (yet to see you write anything remotely productive or interesting though) just speaks volume about your obsession about Barça which of course is understandable. Probably a lot more interesting than spending time on whatever thread (does it even exist?) about Bayern on RedCafe. The main topic of that thread is probably when Bayern will win their 11th farmers league title in a row, whether in February or March. So you have plenty of time to troll elsewhere, I understand, or mourn the almost annual exit in the CL to a Spanish team.:lol:

Not so much travelling, or? Mallorca is about the nearest away ground outside of Barcelona - Milan is a 90 minutes flight. then two home matches, away to Madrid, then 3 home matches and Valencia.

All the national home matches and the Mallorca match should not be tough tasks either. All of the teams with international matches have 2 matches a week until the World Cup...
What has the difficulty of a schedule to do with traveling? Spain is a large country and Europe is a relatively large continent but traveling in the year 2022 for a top football club is not about distance. We are not talking about travel to Kamchatka here.

It is about the difficulty of the schedule unless you are going to claim that the schedule that I mentioned, all within just 1 month, is an easy one? Yes, I don't recall such a though (on paper) schedule for Barça within 1 month, in recent memory, what is wrong with that?
 
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simonhch

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Barca fans celebrating that their salary cap has been raised for next season, not realising that that was the only thing protecting the club from themselves. Cue more bankruptcy level spending.
 

ilrm

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I think Barca will implode sooner than later. Their immediate schedule includes Inter (H), Madrid (A), Villarreal (H), Bilbao (H) and Bayern (H). I can see them dropping points at Madrid (A) and one out of Villareal (H) and Bilbao (H). Madrid on the other hand have only 2 tricky fixtures Atletico (A) and Bara (H) interspersed with winnable games.
 

GatoLoco

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What does not destroy you makes you stronger.

Barcelona will be much improved after this series of matches.
 

Pickle85

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What is the matter with you, did you swallow some sauerkraut or a Frankfurter? I understand that Bayern fans are not used to such a schedule as your team spends most of its existence in a secondary farmers league by large. Yes, those Frankfurters had their few seconds of glory last year against a historically poor Barça team but even a blind hen can also find grain once in a while.

Anyway your continuous presence in this thread (yet to see you write anything remotely productive or interesting though) just speaks volume about your obsession about Barça which of course is understandable. Probably a lot more interesting than spending time on whatever thread (does it even exist?) about Bayern on RedCafe. The main topic of that thread is probably when Bayern will win their 11th farmers league title in a row, whether in February or March. So you have plenty of time to troll elsewhere, I understand, or mourn the almost annual exit in the CL to a Spanish team.:lol:



What has the difficulty of a schedule to do with traveling? Spain is a large country and Europe is a relatively large continent but traveling in the year 2022 for a top football club is not about distance. We are not talking about travel to Kamchatka here.

It is about the difficulty of the schedule unless you are going to claim that the schedule that I mentioned, all within just 1 month, is an easy one? Yes, I don't recall such a though (on paper) schedule for Barça within 1 month, in recent memory, what is wrong with that?
You are absolutely unbearable. 'Even a blind hen can find grain...' - are you Miguel de Cervantes?! What a bizarre aphorism. And in terms of the difficulty of the schedule, two points: firstly, the lack of travel absolutely factors into why it's not a demanding schedule and the fact that you ask why it's an issue only emphasizes your lack of knowledge/awareness. Also, sorry to disappoint, but with any kind of context beyond your myopic eurocentric take...no. Spain is not a big country.
 

stefan92

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You are absolutely unbearable. 'Even a blind hen can find grain...' - are you Miguel de Cervantes?! What a bizarre aphorism.
Don't know where he is from, but that is a quite common saying in Germany and not a bizarre aphorism. Though I fully agree that the influx of Barca newbies really turned this thread into a car crash...
 

Pickle85

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Don't know where he is from, but that is a quite common saying in Germany and not a bizarre aphorism. Though I fully agree that the influx of Barca newbies really turned this thread into a car crash...
Fair enough. Never heard of it myself but Google seems to have it as a German saying. Is @CruyffMaradonaMessi German? If so, why the barca love in?
 

stefan92

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Fair enough. Never heard of it myself but Google seems to have it as a German saying. Is @CruyffMaradonaMessi German? If so, why the barca love in?
Who knows, could be Dutch as well and would make more sense considering the user name and the fact that Barca was through Cruyff some kind of Dutch outpost in Spanish football.
 

Pickle85

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Who knows, could be Dutch as well and would make more sense considering the user name and the fact that Barca was through Cruyff some kind of Dutch outpost in Spanish football.
Is it a Dutch phrase too then? I'm getting my investigative hat on
 

WeePat

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First they were the bestest ever team in roller hockey and now they win the hardest most brutal 8 game stretch ever known to man cup.

What an incredible couple of days for Barca. Xavi has worked miracles with this team, I have to admit.
 

CruyffMaradonaMessi

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You are absolutely unbearable. 'Even a blind hen can find grain...' - are you Miguel de Cervantes?! What a bizarre aphorism. And in terms of the difficulty of the schedule, two points: firstly, the lack of travel absolutely factors into why it's not a demanding schedule and the fact that you ask why it's an issue only emphasizes your lack of knowledge/awareness. Also, sorry to disappoint, but with any kind of context beyond your myopic eurocentric take...no. Spain is not a big country.
Talk about some users getting their panties in a twist. I hope that this is a correct English saying.

No, travel does not factor into anything in most European top leagues due to the relatively small size of European countries and Europe (in particular the geography of 90% or so of all participating CL clubs) and the modern comforts of travel that a club like Barça and every top club can easily afford.

Spain is the fourth largest country in Europe, so yes, it is a large country. What are you even talking about? Eurocentric what? We are talking about Barça and European football, what am I supposed to be comparing with? Mongolian, Brazilian, Australian etc. football? Lastly do you really think that I am not aware of the fact that Europe as a whole is a small continent in terms of geography when I wrote the exact same thing earlier today? Jesus Christ.

Fair enough. Never heard of it myself but Google seems to have it as a German saying. Is @CruyffMaradonaMessi German? If so, why the barca love in?
Why do you care where I am from? Where are you from? I think that I made it perfectly clear that I am from Spain. Wrote a post in Spanish in this thread a few days ago too. With ancestral ties to Italy on my mother's side. That's about all I am going to say. As for that saying, I have seen it online before and find it quite fitting on certain occasions. As for languages, I speak quite a few, but that is irrelevant altogether. Since you are this interested, you can see my introduction post in the introduction thread on the Newbie forum.

First they were the bestest ever team in roller hockey and now they win the hardest most brutal 8 game stretch ever known to man cup.

What an incredible couple of days for Barca. Xavi has worked miracles with this team, I have to admit.
Another troll with too much time on his hand? In which universe were your claims ever stated by me? I wrote that I don't recall a similar hard schedule for 1 month of football as a Barça fan in recent memory. Never wrote anything remotely similar to your trolling. Similarly with roller hockey which I never wrote anything about other than stating that it is not a completely irrelevant sport (factual statement) and certainly more popular worldwide than fencing.

No miracles either, we have to see how this season ends. Xavi is almost obligated to win something this season, preferably the league. If he does not win anything this season and the team collapses, his days are likely limited. Barça cannot afford another season in the wilderness after such investments and with such a squad.

What does not destroy you makes you stronger.

Barcelona will be much improved after this series of matches.
We will have to see. I don't trust the mental fortitude of the team yet. A few bad results next month and I would not be surprised if everything turns bleak, including the local media and Spanish media as a whole engaging in their usual toxicity and drama.
 
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B. Munich

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It's not like only Barcelona faces these challenges.
All top teams in Europe have absolutely packed schedules until the world cup. Barcelona aren't an exception here.
English teams like United, Chelsea and Liverpool are even hit harder by the two matches being postponed lately.
 

CruyffMaradonaMessi

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It's not like only Barcelona faces these challenges.
All top teams in Europe have absolutely packed schedules until the world cup. Barcelona aren't an exception here.
English teams like United, Chelsea and Liverpool are even hit harder by the two matches being postponed lately.
Once again, who claimed the opposite? Not me. You are stating the obvious here.

I was specifically talking about the schedule FOR Barça and that I don’t recall such a hard month (October 2022) for Barça on paper in recent memory. I am also quite sure that very few top teams in Europe (CL participants) have such a hard schedule on paper for the next month, now that you guys have started the business of comparing schedules.

The whole schedule thing was written in relation to Barça being a team under construction. See post 6,887.

Jordi Cruyff has signed a new 1-year contract extension as the sports director. This is welcome news as he, Alemany and others did a great job of cleaning up the gigantic mess after Bartomeu.
 
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MegadrivePerson

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It's not like only Barcelona faces these challenges.
All top teams in Europe have absolutely packed schedules until the world cup. Barcelona aren't an exception here.
English teams like United, Chelsea and Liverpool are even hit harder by the two matches being postponed lately.
The postponed games won't get played until after the world cup and will probably help all three of those clubs as they have all had a mixed start to the season.
 

Niemans

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Once again, who claimed the opposite? Not me. You are stating the obvious here.

I was specifically talking about the schedule FOR Barça and that I don’t recall such a hard month (October 2022) for Barça on paper in recent memory. I am also quite sure that very few top teams in Europe (CL participants) have such a hard schedule on paper for the next month, now that you guys have started the business of comparing schedules.

The whole schedule thing was written in relation to Barça being a team under construction. See post 6,887.

Jordi Cruyff has signed a new 1-year contract extension as the sports director. This is welcome news as he, Alemany and others did a great job of cleaning up the gigantic mess after Bartomeu.
And Gavi had a great day yesterday, renewal and goal?

https://youtube.com/shorts/CwCSBiRyqUA?feature=share
 

CruyffMaradonaMessi

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And Gavi had a great day yesterday, renewal and goal?

https://youtube.com/shorts/CwCSBiRyqUA?feature=share
El vídeo de Nacho Jiménez ayer en lo de Gavi ya lleva 15 millones de reproducciones. :lol:

I read not long ago that Gavi continues to live in La Masía and that he acts like a father figure to the young players. Maybe he moved elsewhere now but I think that this speaks well of him and that all the fame has not went to his head. He is similar in this regard to Pedri. Another similarity with Don Andrés and Xavi that the new duo has. If they can just be half as successful as them, we are in for a very exciting time. Time will tell.
 
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