hiddink-barcelona

I didn’t see Barca battering Chelsea. I didn’t see them smash Londoners out of the park. I didn’t see them humiliate the Blues. Well, also I didn’t see them scoring at Nou Camp and I didn’t see a certain Lionel Messi on the pitch! We all must be laughing at all those journos who predicted a 4-0 and 5-0 wins. Get real guys! As I wrote in the preview post, you must be rather naive to expect a Chelsea team to be dominated like that. While the hype-loving journos were expecting to see an attacking masterclass from Barcelona, what we all saw was a defensive masterclass from Chelsea.

Five minutes into the match, I was thinking ‘Barca are not scoring tonight’. Half hour later, I realised this had a striking similarity to the last season’s semi finals against Man Utd at Nou Camp. The tactic from Chelsea was pretty simple. Allow Barca to play their game and intervene when it matters most. Don’t allow the final ball. And get physical as much as required. Break Barca’s rhythm. Chelsea just did a very fine job of achieving what they wanted to.

As you’d expect Barca had all the possession, they passed all night but they just didn’t threaten us. This is an unusual thing to say about any Barcelona attack. But this attack that comprised of Eto, Henry and Messi plus the midfield of Xavi, Iniesta and Toure just did not threaten Chelsea at all. If you look at the real chances, probably they had three and we had two. Actually, they were more threatening when Alves started to cross it in towards the end of the game than they were all game long.

Defensively, we were top class. Completely nullified Barca and had them run out of ideas. I was pretty impressed with Bosingwa’s work with Messi and Ivanovic’s marking of Henry. Terry was a bit suspect but was not too much to worry. Overall, we simply owned them with our defence. What was more heartening to see was Cech’s performance. He is certainly getting back to his usual best. He got most of the things right. In the first half, he went out of position for a improbable catch and popped out a ball that he must have comfortably caught. Other than that, he was spot on. The saves that he produced against Eto and Hleb were real class. Our midfield appeared a little lost because we weren’t keen to attack. When we are not planning to attack heavily, when you have Mikel in the team, the midfield of Ballack, Lampard and Essien would certainly struggle due to the lack of purpose and that’s exactly what happened.

But if had one gripe from this match that was the way we attacked whenever we had the ball. It was pretty much as per plan that we saw less of the ball but when we did have it, we were awful and careless going forward. I know most of them were busy in defence but in such cases you may not go for a counterattack but normal slow build-up attacks must have happened much better.

Barcelona have scored 100+ goals at an average of about 2.9 goals per match this season, which is a phenomenal record. Their goal tally and goal difference is the biggest in the whole of Europe. They have scored in every single match at Nou Camp this season. And against Chelsea, they scored none in front of their fans. Before someone jumps to ask ‘how on earth can you be proud about not conceding’, let me say ‘we got what we wanted’. We wanted to take home a draw. A goal draw would have better but goalless is fine as well. Though this result does not confirm anything at all, this certainly is a set back for Barcelona.

This weekend, Chelsea would play Fulham in the premier league. Hiddink can afford to rest key players this weekend ahead of the second leg next week. Meanwhile, Barcelona have their most important league match of this season – the el clasico. To play against Real Madrid at Santiago Bernabeu must be the last thing Guardiola wants between two Chelsea matches, especially after the first leg at Nou Camp ended at 0-0. This weekend’s result in the el clasico would have a huge impact on the second leg. If Real Madrid wins, that would completely unsettle Barca. And, they might then have to play a well-rested Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. Plus, Puyol is now suspended and Marquez seems to be out for a few weeks. And Ashley Cole would be back. Messi was invisible tonight even when Barca were longing to score. When Ashley’s back, I’ll have no worries.

To summarise, at kick-off, Barca had an objective and Chelsea had one too. Chelsea achieved theirs and Barca did not. It’s as simple as that. If you want to understand this better, suppose Barca wanted a goalless draw and Chelsea wanted a goal. Chelsea would have still achieved their objective leaving Barca disappointed. 0-0 is never too comforting but there are so many other factors that make me more comfortable – Real Madrid’s possible win this weekend, key injuries/suspension in Barca and the general set back and understandable low morale of high fliers that are brought down to earth.

Peace Chelsitos! We are winning at the Bridge!