EL CLASSICO

My Dear Real Madrid Fans

On Saturday, 26th, October we have a great opportunity to beat Barcelona at Camp Nou and bring back to Santiago Bernabeu THREE valuable points.

Barcelona is NOT the team of Pep Guardiola and their attack is NOT as potent as it used to be.

Xavi and Iniesta do not have the penetrating insight that they used to.

And the great Messi needs time to fully recover.

Neymar is still settling in.

Valdes is on his way out

Pujol has just come out of a injury.

With all this going on, Real Madrid has a great opportunity of winning and bringing the 3 valuable points to Madrid.

You Madrid Fans stand together and have positive thoughts.

We can do this.

We need your positive energy to carry the TEAM forward.  

What happened to Barcelona?

What happened to Barcelona today?

They played good football but just couldn't convert.

Was this because of the absence of Messi?

But Messi played a for a brief period and Neymar was good.

The problem was no one stepped up to the plate and took responsibility.

Fabregas was awful for a footballer of his class.

Neymar played very well but why doesn't he finish and start scoring goals?

Iniesta and Xavi are not the players that were so dangerous last season.

I think Barcelona is vulnerable and if they fall behind, I believe they will have a mountain to scale.

And frankly I don't think they can make it. 

Rayo Vallecano did not test Barcelona

There is no justice in football.

This afternoon at Vallecas, Rayo Vallecano was fast, fighting for every ball, not giving the Barcelona forwards the luxury of time on the ball.

It was a beautiful fast paced game. Initially Barcelona was beginning to exert control, then Rayo reversed the tide and ended the 45 minutes spending more and more time in the Barcelona half.

In the first half, Rayo created one clear chance of goal of where Victor Valdes had to make a tremendous save and then Victor saved a penalty taken by the Rayo Captain - Treshorras.

Messi's skills were on display for a couple of dribbles and on one occasion he laid off a beautiful pass to the right to Pedro who made no mistake in scoring. Barcelona also tried to get Neymar, playing on the left wing, into the game, but today was not Neymar's afternoon. He did not take advantage of any balls passed to him nor did he pose much of a danger.

Barcelona went into the changing room at half time, thanking the Footballing Gods, for retaining their slender one goal lead.

The second half was totally different.

Rayo Vallecano had lost all its fight as soon as Pedro scored his second goal - which may have been offside. But it did not matter. Pedro completed his hattrick and Cesc Fabrigas scored the fourth goal.

Barcelona won 4-0.

Its a pity that Rayo does not have a couple of quality players. I believe that had Rayo Vallecano taken its chances and scored a couple of goals in the first half, the result of the match would had been quite different.

Barcelona is not the same Barcelona of old. They are not playing their attractive football nor are they being tested.

I would like to see how this Barcelona team reacts to a situation when they are behind say 1-0 or even 2-0. It will be a test of their character.

 

 

 

 

Barcelona outclasses Ajax and romps home 4-0

Barcelona outclassed Ajax and won by a wide margin 4-0.

The match was very similar to Real Madrid's match yesterday.

Messi scored a beauty from a free kick in the first half but the match didn't open up until the second half. Messi, Neymar, Alexis Sanchez ran riot and darted in and out of the Ajax area with total freedom.

However with all this possession in Ajax's area, Barcelona only managed to score 4 including a Messi hattrick. Pique chipped in with a header and was promptly rewarded by being substituted - maybe he got a niggling injury.

It was sad that Ajax could not convert a penalty. It would have been a little consolation.

This sums up the match. Ajax were not in the same League as Barcelona - not in same class. My opinion is that the Champions League should really be restricted to the top flight teams and not open to mediocre teams who fill in the 16 available slots.

The style of football that Barcelona played to night was not very attractive - so should I say was not the style that we have become used to. In my opinion if they carry on playing this way, it is very likely that good teams will force draws and maybe wins against Barcelona in the Liga this year.

Barcelona was not dominant.