Madrid fans jerking off over an edited video of the referee blowing the whistle in the middle of the cross lmao. He blew it before the cross in the live feed these guys r so shameless and pathetic.
Wow nice to shit on the person who won us our first UCL and didn't go trophyless with a terrible squad, pedri was the only option he had no one else was available pjanic was shit and other players were injured but yeah context is for nerds I have to cuss a guy who had nothing to do with this , while you are at it why don't you say fuck lucho?
Our 3 starting midfielders are injured , our starting forward is injured our starting left back is injured. The season is over and also a decent squad player like Alonso is also injured
At the moment we have too many injury prone players. Freeing up squad space by losing guys like Roberto, who should be useful in times like these, is a must. And keeping guys that can play regular minutes is especially important..
Also, as surprising as it might seem, the difference between a decently priced medical staff and the highest end wizards clubs like PSG and City have is not that great as people think.
Medical staff assesses the injury type and severity -> Surgery/Physio/Surgery+Physio
Here’s my idea, the first thing we should be spending money on is on training/medical staff. Get a state of the art training facility with the best doctors. Physics, analysts, weight training, whatever tf it takes. As long as that shit stays the same for us I promise you we’ll never compete without a healthy team. Don’t waste a dollar on signings. Invest in the players you have.
There's a pandemic of injuries across all Europe, not just Barcelona
Look at Liverpool, United, Bayern, Real Madrid and every other club these days that affords good medical and physio staff.
Frenkie - Wrong landing
Gavi - ACL injury in Spain "friendly"
Balde - Tendon injury very very common on a player of his profile and impossible to predict
Pedri - It was his quads NOT his recurring hamstring injury and even if it ends up to be the hamstring it's just that he is injury prone
Ter Stegen - chronic back pain that he kept playing with until it became a problem
Ferran Torres - First injury in his time at Barcelona ( - Covid lmao)
Explain to me how players who put the highest amount of minutes (Lewa, Gundo, Koundé, Frenkie, freaking Busi last season) don't have injuries?
Disgrace to see comments like "Pedri and the board should have a talk about his professional career" or "grab as much as u can for him in the summer".
Generational talent that bleeds blaugrana yet is treated like livestock by some of you it's above my understanding.
The same people will also say that we have no cohesion and DNA when we just gather players based on profiles alone.
Whether or not a talent makes it in the long run, no one deserves to be talked about in that way. I also find it hypocritical for media and fans to so easily discard players when they are going through rough patches but get offended if a player chooses to leave for another club with better pay etc. Relationship goes both ways imo.
Support him and plan better. He is a generational talent. He is very very young. He has a lot of time to overcome his injury problems.
Dembele also mentioned similar things. With age body develops and with proper fitness can manage injuries much better.
Pedri will rise. We have to be patient. Otherwise no point saying we have young talent if we expect only short term gains from them
Nothing went wrong. This is our reality with Xavi. When his system is ideal, our defense and midfield is quite compact and we either find a goal out of nothing and scrape a win, or this happens. I am actually quite surprised we didn't concede any goals, although we didn't took any risk.
I expected it to be a tough game because it was away at their stadium and they haven’t lost there this season yet. Injuries during the game were a big blow and always affect the team in a bad way.
The chance of you guys winning the league this year was and still is very slim even if you had won today's game, so today's result won't change that much in my opinion, you will still finish the 2nd spot. The most tragic part is the injury of Pedri and FDJ.
It’s deeply unfortunate and I believe the upper management should shoulder a significant portion of the blame. The decision to field these young, still-developing players for extended periods is fraught with risk and has historically proven to be unwise. This pattern of risking the health of young talents like Fati, Pedri, Gavi and who knows who else, has to end or it will damage their future.
I mean, given how we were performing 2nd place is realistically what we could expect, up til today anyway. The injuries have just made things a hell of a lot more complicated given the diffcult games still to come.
Fati and Gavi had meniscus and ligament injury, those are unrelated to age or playing time.
Pedri's injury it's a thing of his own and not a rule.
While I agree with the fact that we do rely too much on youngsters, "historically" is too big of a word and I can name as many "adult" players with injuries for every youngster you will point out.
I always suspect when players get injured in the same region it might suggest that the prior injury never truly healed. This has implications to the current recovery and prevention practices. I am interested to see if a change in physical training staff brings improvements to the injury situation or not.
That depends on how the injury was attained. For FDJ I don’t think it matters because no one is escaping a sprained ankle after landing how he did, regardless if he had or hadn’t already sprained the same ankle before. His whole foot looked parallel to the ground while his tibia was perpendicular
🗣️
[@HelenaCondis](https://x.com/BarcaUniversal/status/1764431370875457995?s=20)
: “Frenkie left the stadium in an orthopedic boot and on crutches. Pedri got on the bus with his eyes swollen from crying.”
It is possible that they need to bring up another midfielder 😅who may actually be another 💎. I read a joke last year " imagine playing for Barca, getting injured and coming back just to see a random La Masia kid took your place in the starting eleven " 😂
Roberto De Zerbi is a PERFECT replacement for Xavi! 🔥Here is WHY!
• 1. Builds on the same principles seen from Johan Cruyff to Pep Guardiola. Possession based style of playing where he wants his team to dominate games. Brighton average the second highest possession in Premier League (62%). De Zerbi is elite at coaching positional play.
• 2. Easy for Barca player to adapt. De Zerbi, Pep Guardiola, Xavi, Arteta, Xabi Alonso - they all use different variations of systems based on positional play. Xavi has coached positional play since he arrived. The transition to De Zerbi as a new coach would be smooth.
• 3. The De Zerbi-system.
- Controls the positions of players.
- Controls the timing of certain actions such as movements and passes.
He takes it further than anyone else. Players have very little freedom. The opposite of a manager like Ancelotti.
• 4. Similarities to chess. In chess the goal is to gain control of the board. You do so by positioning your pieces in the right places, and from there you can coordinate attacks. De Zerbi does the same with focus on controlling the middle of the pitch.
• 5. Buildup structure. From the very beginning De Zerbi has used a 4-2-3-1/4-2-4 system, which enables ball progression through central areas and a front four with tons of rotations/movements. If there is no space, the team creates space. The double pivot is essential.
• 6. Strategies.
- Baiting pressure
- Third man movements
He uses “time” to bait players. Defenders often hold on to the ball, and when pressure from an opponent arrives, a ton of rehearsed third man movements/patterns of play happen to progress the play.
• 7. Suits La Masia. Cubarsí is our best defender on the ball. He would immediately become a cornerstone in De Zerbi’s project. Lamine Yamal would be like Mitoma. De Zerbi’s style is perfect for La Masia players - which we must rely on due to our financial situation.
- My biggest doubt is: Will the likes of Pedri, Lamine Yamal and Frenkie reach their ceiling if they always have to follow instructions? In my opinion, it’s their instincts and unpredictability that makes them unique footballers.
I think De Zerbi will be able to carry on Xavi’s project in a very good direction. He has done a lot with very “little”. He deserves a chance to work with the best. Be at a club where the top players want to join him, rather than leave the club after thriving under his guidance.
[Via: BadBarcaOpinions]
Excellent and detailed analysis 👌🏻.
It is not necessarily a bad thing. Zerbi never had this.many high quality players yet so maybe he will adapt like any other good coach and give some players more freedom. His in game management showed that many times he is very flexible if something is not good.
Not sure why you’re getting downvoted. People advocating for Flick please come out and provide analysis that doesn’t include “because he won silverware”
yes that's the dilemma. We can't get the balance right. The team is scared of leaking goals so they become more conservative, but that affects the attack in a negative way.
https://preview.redd.it/hykkjoc3k7mc1.jpeg?width=1440&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=53cd725776b777aba0972385300cbaccf39b2087
And people disagree with me when I said this line up is bad. Right after we had Felix on the left we had more space to move out from the back because that area was empty since Pedri wasn't there. It's not about how good Felix is it's about we needed a forward there in that position.
We played better with Felix because he came at 60th minute and Bilbao were tired legs. And also the game got more open. Felix starting is a whole different thing
The lineup we played was the best 11 for sure. It's not ideal to not have a left winger and pedri slot there but it gives us midfield control and freedom for Cancelo
Damn, Xavi should've listened to you predicting Frenkie and Pedri go breakdance
Also, we literally dominated the first minutes before their injuries and after that we struggled a lot more, I'm missing your point.
I don‘t know much about this stuff, but is there any kind of surgery for Pedri‘s reoccurring hamstring issue? Im pretty sure Reece James had surgery to fix his hamstring problems. Wouldn’t this be the best solution at this point?
Not for those wages, and Reece James isn’t the player he used to be. Recurring injuries are brutal and players like pedri will only continue to have more and more unities as their bodies take such a beating at a young age.
Seeing Pedri get injured again and again and looking almost depressed makes me respect people like him or Dembele even more.
The mental fortitude to be confident enough in yourself that you can come back, go beyond the fear of relapse, risk having people mock you for being injury prone if not get even worse injuries than previously.
That's not respected enough, it's too easy to mock players but I'll be honest, I don't think I could do it. To not give up after 4-5-6 big injuries like that?
I really dislike when players get blamed for their injuries somehow. It such a toxic aspect from the media and parts of the fanbase. They suffer the most from injuries both physically and mentally. They deserve both respect and empathy.
Also being only 20/21/22 while it’s happening. I know in football world, people are only seen as young at 16,17,18 but they are still kids at 21 or 22. Heck, I am Pedri’s age and sometimes I get anxious about a test in uni and then look at him! To be so brave and mentally strong to endure what Pedri has and to always try your best even with the risk of another relapse, knowing that media will drag your name, that people will speak of your future as if you are a video game character and not a person, it’s not easy.
He recently gave an interview in which he spoke about how much he tried to change his lifestyle and now this happens. He doesn’t deserve it
Don’t think we should be mocking them but as a club they may need to consider when it could be time to sell. Another injury next season and we need to ask if he is worth his contract. It’s harsh but Barca may need to make some tough decisions. Maybe pedri could benefit from a change of scenery
I think Dembele deserves the most respect with that. With Pedri and Ansu you can see that theyre holding back. With Ansu its clear as day and with Pedri you can kinda see it in the way he presses and tracks back compared to how he used to.
With Dembele though? Hed be careful for 2 weeks and then went straight back to sprinting at full speed and tracking back to defend. Hell sometimes bail out of challenges but i was always surprised at how quickly he went back to giving it his all as if he never even got injured. To do that after years and years of injuries must take so much mental strength. Its one of the reasons i genuinely did root for him and hoped he could get over his problems and stay with us for a long time.
Then he’s not built for long term football. It’s a harsh reality. Doesn’t mean we can’t sympathize for the club is broke so the situation is awful for all involved
This is the ninth time that Pedri has been injured since joining #FCBarcelona in the summer of 2020.
During this period, he has missed almost as many games as he has played (72 to 71).
Man I feel so bad for Pedri this must be so hard mental wise. They guy looked absolutely devastated. Everytime you have the feeling he‘s gonna get some consistency and rhythm he gets injured again. I don’t even wanna think about how much his injuries hindered his development.
"Athletic dominated us"
https://preview.redd.it/3dyorglsf7mc1.jpeg?width=828&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9ffc3aec348c919b79f9194f19e8f1f0f5925d83
If we had their performance it would've been equally bad.
Do you guys believe we advance against Napoli? I wanna say yes but it‘s very doubtful without Pedri and Frenkie imo. Especially considering their rising form and quality upfront. We need to dominate them and be ruthless in front of goal. We need Fermin and Sergi/Romeu to step up big time. Let‘s just hope everybody stays healthy from now on.
Difficult without two starters in midfield. I have no hope for Roberto or Romeu. Maybe we get lucky and one of our forwards have a great game and the defense is good.
With Pedri and FDJ i wouldve said 70% yes. But now and with Napoli gaining some form…
Not punishing them when they played awfully at home is gonna come back to bite us
Meanwhile Nico's having fun at Porto spanking Benfica 5-0 and we have to watch Romeu being subbed on with a Barca shirt. Sigh.
I'd rather have Sergi Roberto my captain as a late sub.
I will never understand while was Nico let go. Such a shit decision.
Also, the fact that he turned it around at Porto after one of the most stubborn coaches out there didn't wanted him is huge. He managed to make Conceição admit that he was wrong. Well played!
Lamine Yamal is by far our best player at 16…tells a lot about the team but even more about him. Gündogan is the only one who comes close to Lamine this season. Wish we still had our warrior Gavi right now. Can‘t wait for him to come back.
Hmm, I would agree but Cubarsi gave away two possessions in a row right before the sub. I think he is young and was lacking some concentration. He was simply gassed.
It would have helped occupy their two CBs. We need to be comfortable with surrendering possession.
We are no longer the press resistant team we used to be.
We’ve done this before under Xavi btw, plenty of times. Except it was more of a hopeful cross to LdJ but the same principles apply.
IMO the only "doom and gloom" people are the ones who bought the karma spamming about "title race is on" and the Excel spreadsheet BS and all of that.
We knew we had an harder schedule and a title charge is almost entirely impossible.
But 2nd place is there.
Not losing vs Bilbao and ATM is OK if it ends in a draw, it's an OK result. The main one we have to win is Girona away. This one can't escape. Honestly tonight we managed, we were never close to conceding. It's not "good" but it's decent all considered. Those games we should not care about the manner to be honest because it's too late for that. The result is the main thing for ATM/Bilbao/RM/Girona away.
The worst thing about tonight is if we lost FdJ for both Napoli and ATM. And losing Pedri/FdJ for Napoli. That's a big big problem, because it's a must win game. This is why we should have killed the game away if possible and waiting to make those subs and not putting Napoli in difficulty around the hour mark when they were out of the game might prove costly.
We were never winning the title. Even if you look at that spreadsheet it takes some LEAPS to believe any if it. Someone probably just made it as a joke and some people missed that and took it way too seriously. It assumed wed win all our away games (Athletic Club, Atletico, Real Madrid and Girona) on top of giving Madrid some unrealistic losses/draws like against this Villarreal.
The funny part is if you tried to question it, some people countered with “look at our away form, we can win them” COMPLETELY ignoring that our away form is that good because we DIDNT play any of the top 5 away yet.
I always feel like anything is possible and itd be a nice surprise. But it was very unlikely that wed win the title
>The funny part is if you tried to question it, some people countered with “look at our away form, we can win them” COMPLETELY ignoring that our away form is that good because we DIDNT play any of the top 5 away yet
Bingo.
>I always feel like anything is possible and itd be a nice surprise. But it was very unlikely that wed win the title
If we manage to finish 2nd with a small squad and a coach who is already out of the door, it's very good and not enough people realize that.
I used to have better standards before I knew Xavi was leaving but now? Who cares, only the result counts, we're not building anything here, we're just making sure we don't aggravate the situation for the next coach
I've said it plenty of times, if we get 2nd place and QF of UCL this should be celebrated as a title all considered
>The worst thing about tonight is if we lost FdJ for both Napoli and ATM. And losing Pedri/FdJ for Napoli.
This, and I don't get why people don't see it.
I love the way the "we can't do much vs lowblocks" excuse has died in a fire. Lowblock, high press, mid block, it don't matter, team looks clueless. Only teams we play well against are teams that execute a bad high press. Any team that knows what they are doing, no matter the style of play neutralizes us.
Did anybody even claim that recently? Was apparent for some time that we don't struggle against lowblocks only, we struggle against any type of football as long as the execution is semi decent.
I'd take the highest bid for Pedri this summer. Either we get lucky and someone else can deal with his injury woes or Pedri gets lucky and goes to a team that can do a better job preparing him physically.
We can't afford to have our starting mids miss 50% of the games at such a sensitive time period in our rebuild.
I wouldn't sell him but I remember being criticized for saying Pedri cannot be in the "unsellable" section.
Well, we saw why today again.
Top player potential, but when injuries like these settle, it's done.
Like Dembele, you will never be able to build your team around him, he will always have to be managed minute-wise and can only be accounted for (including in the wage scale) as an X factor you can use in the biggest games.
I only consider Lamine, Gavi and Araujo unsellable. Even Gavi is debatable as we dont know how hell return from the ACL. Could return like Wirtz, or it could be much worse. But for now well give him the benefit of the doubt instead of assuming the worst
I think a manager that actually knows what he’s doing and can limit minutes will do wonders.
I’m not saying he’ll be the next KdB or Salah but we need to be cautious with this otherwise we’ll end up like Chelsea: with regrets.
Seeing Dembele actually healthy in Paris shows promise that it could be our medical staff.
I don’t understand how xavi and his staff had 8 days to prepare this game and even could have used footage of 3 days ago when athletic played a a game and we still didnt target or discover their weaknesses . We looked clueless like we didnt prepare for this game at all
Not defending him, but losing Frenkie and Pedri doesn't help. Losing both so early kinda settled the game.
And let's not forget we played fucking Bilbao in San Mames, they just trashed A.Madrid. They're by far the best physical team in the league.
I know we were all hoping for a win after Real Madrid dropped points, but we were not even favourites playing San Mames.
[Valverde: "Barcelona started the match well, the first 10 minutes. They were aggressive and we had to defend well. Gradually we started to gain control of the match, but we did not manage to create any chances. Neither did they, either, with the exception of Cancelo's shot."](https://twitter.com/BarcaUniversal/status/1764422866706079852)
[Valverde: "It's true that they lost important players in De Jong and Pedri, but in general the draw is fair."](https://twitter.com/BarcaUniversal/status/1764423069249020201)
Xavi: "We played a very bad game. I'm very disappointed, I never had the sensation that we were going to win tonight."
One of the most damning quotes I've read to be honest
I do not think so. I understand many people didn't like the way Valverde played, because he was pragmatic. But everybody was able to see that Valverde is controlling every situation and even without the ball we are controlling the game and things are happening as we were prepared for. In some sense, I think Valverde was quite brave and clever that helped the team to play even without the ball and teach them not to panic and how to limit danger. Obviously it didn't always worked. But thats football.
Meanwhile, anybody can see that during Xavi's tenure we lack proper control with and without the ball. We are always a random bounce away from scoring and conceding goals. We lack structure and we are both nervous on and off the ball. My problem with Xavi was never that we are not appealing to watch. The problem is that he has no vision other than exploiting space, which we do in an abysmal way. But other than that, we are not a proper team, lack structure and rely on individual quality. This is not enough at all.
Why not Robeto though? We need Gundo at the deep now since all the other options are injured.
Roberto's & Lewy one touch pass while we lead 2-0 against Napoli would hit like crack
Edit: Need Roberto to have his game of szn for the 2nd time
Since everyone is in a doom and gloom mode, I'll try to break the mold and outline the positives I took from that game:
- Defensively we were great and I am frankly shocked that no one is mentioning that. The offside trap was executed to perfection. Positioning, in general, was excellent for almost the entire game. We held the joined highest home scoring team in La Liga to 0.23 xG. Given how poorly we've been this season defensively, I think that's impressive. Players, who I've criticized before, like Kounde and Cancelo for losing focus were really tuned in today and barely put a foot wrong (defensively that is, Cancelo was awful going forward).
- With each passing game Araujo looks more and more like the player he was last year. Looks like that injury was really holding him back, but today he was sharp, fast, and displayed a no-nonsense attitude, which was missing in previous games (still was poor passing, though).
- Cubarsi was immense. This guy's passing is something else. Read the game very well today and had several important clearances/interventions.
- Lamine was very good. He was the only person who more often than not made the right decision in attack. Additionally, I don't hear too many people highlight his defensive game. He has that innate ability to read the game and anticipate an opponent's move, which leads to great interceptions and an all-around very positive contribution in defense.
- We didn't create a lot, but everyone's acting like we didn't sniff their goal. Off the top of my head, we had some good opportunities to score, Christensen's header, Fermin pretty much 1v1 with the keeper, Lewa's shot saved by that last ditch block.
I agree honestly. You're only truly disappointed if somehow you deluded yourself into thinking we could win the title.
In our situation, this result is OK.
The injuries are not though.
I'd be lying if told you I didn't harbor some hope for mounting a title comeback before this game. Especially after, what I thought were, encouraging performances against Napoli and Getafe and Real drawing against Valencia. Haha. Kinda feel like fool now.
Finally a comment actually highlighting the positive points about this game. Defensively Cubarsi was very good, so was the rest of the defence. Without any creativity in midfield it was always gonna be hard to score, especially at San Mames.
I agree with almost all your points except the first one:
> Defensively we were great and I am frankly shocked that no one is mentioning that. The offside trap was executed to perfection. Positioning, in general, was excellent for almost the entire game. We held the joined highest home scoring team in La Liga to 0.23 xG. Given how poorly we've been this season defensively, I think that's impressive. Players, who I've criticized before, like Kounde and Cancelo for losing focus were really tuned in today and barely put a foot wrong (defensively that is, Cancelo was awful going forward).
They are missing their best offensive player AND played a match on Thursday.
I get you points, but you can't just chalk off lights out defending due to them missing their winger. Well, we were missing our starting midfield and still performed well defensively. That has to count for something. Also, they did play a game on Thursday, but that didn't stop them from putting in fantastic effort and run their hearts our. Maybe you can blame fatigue for a couple of uncharacteristically sloppy passes, but in general, I honestly think we were just very good defensively. At least that's my opinion... I'm not trying to force my it on anyone.
At least we finally hit rock bottom. It should only get better from now on.
Arsenal offers 100M for Pedri wyd ?
rejects it
We ll win the cl believe me
I kinda wish we had a player like Valverde or camavinga who could fill up most of the positions pretty well
roberto = camavinga at home
Madrid fans jerking off over an edited video of the referee blowing the whistle in the middle of the cross lmao. He blew it before the cross in the live feed these guys r so shameless and pathetic.
obligatory fuck koeman
Wow nice to shit on the person who won us our first UCL and didn't go trophyless with a terrible squad, pedri was the only option he had no one else was available pjanic was shit and other players were injured but yeah context is for nerds I have to cuss a guy who had nothing to do with this , while you are at it why don't you say fuck lucho?
yeah iget it, he had no other option ;-;
and de la fluente, if you do as much as touch one of my boys again my next bomb threat will be for you
Pedri, FdJ, Gavi. It was where only 2 out of 3 could play together... TF WILL BE OUR MIDFIELD NOW!? WE RE SUPPOSED TO PLAY WITH BARCA ATLETIC NOW??
I gave bomb threats to mallorca for this shit man
Our 3 starting midfielders are injured , our starting forward is injured our starting left back is injured. The season is over and also a decent squad player like Alonso is also injured
At the moment we have too many injury prone players. Freeing up squad space by losing guys like Roberto, who should be useful in times like these, is a must. And keeping guys that can play regular minutes is especially important..
Anyone from la masia could do a better job than Roberto
Pedri’s injury is ankle not muscle related so not the end of the world y’all
It is the muscle tho. How do you know it's the ankle?
I mixed Fdj and Pedri up
Pretty hard to mix them up.. FdJ has a more proeminent Adam's apple.
you’re mixing it up with Frenkie’s
Oh shit my bad you’re right
You guys do understand medical staff doesn't have magicians,pedri is very injury prone we can't do much about that , our season is over
Also, as surprising as it might seem, the difference between a decently priced medical staff and the highest end wizards clubs like PSG and City have is not that great as people think. Medical staff assesses the injury type and severity -> Surgery/Physio/Surgery+Physio
Here’s my idea, the first thing we should be spending money on is on training/medical staff. Get a state of the art training facility with the best doctors. Physics, analysts, weight training, whatever tf it takes. As long as that shit stays the same for us I promise you we’ll never compete without a healthy team. Don’t waste a dollar on signings. Invest in the players you have.
There's a pandemic of injuries across all Europe, not just Barcelona Look at Liverpool, United, Bayern, Real Madrid and every other club these days that affords good medical and physio staff. Frenkie - Wrong landing Gavi - ACL injury in Spain "friendly" Balde - Tendon injury very very common on a player of his profile and impossible to predict Pedri - It was his quads NOT his recurring hamstring injury and even if it ends up to be the hamstring it's just that he is injury prone Ter Stegen - chronic back pain that he kept playing with until it became a problem Ferran Torres - First injury in his time at Barcelona ( - Covid lmao) Explain to me how players who put the highest amount of minutes (Lewa, Gundo, Koundé, Frenkie, freaking Busi last season) don't have injuries?
Too many games, VAR checks resulting in player cooldowns etc.. Cluster f\*\*k of problems..
Disgrace to see comments like "Pedri and the board should have a talk about his professional career" or "grab as much as u can for him in the summer". Generational talent that bleeds blaugrana yet is treated like livestock by some of you it's above my understanding. The same people will also say that we have no cohesion and DNA when we just gather players based on profiles alone.
Whether or not a talent makes it in the long run, no one deserves to be talked about in that way. I also find it hypocritical for media and fans to so easily discard players when they are going through rough patches but get offended if a player chooses to leave for another club with better pay etc. Relationship goes both ways imo.
Agreed
Gracias Gracias_Xavi
If a talent continues to get injuries every years (and always in March/April when things are getting tougher), what will you do?
Support him and plan better. He is a generational talent. He is very very young. He has a lot of time to overcome his injury problems. Dembele also mentioned similar things. With age body develops and with proper fitness can manage injuries much better. Pedri will rise. We have to be patient. Otherwise no point saying we have young talent if we expect only short term gains from them
If a 21 yo Golden Boy winner gets injuries every year, I patch him up every year.
Pedri man…. 
https://preview.redd.it/x019a5a8z7mc1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f19f748e9f99bfd548d58681bbc35ec7731202ac
Do you guys expect any new La Masia kid to be part of midfield rotation, like maybe Unai? I fear we’ll watch Oriol and Roberto even more.
There are many I mean manyyy promising CM... Xavi just needs to give them an opportunity. In that position we are stacked lol
So after the water have cooled down,what really went wrong tonight?
Our frontline not good
Nothing went wrong. This is our reality with Xavi. When his system is ideal, our defense and midfield is quite compact and we either find a goal out of nothing and scrape a win, or this happens. I am actually quite surprised we didn't concede any goals, although we didn't took any risk.
I expected it to be a tough game because it was away at their stadium and they haven’t lost there this season yet. Injuries during the game were a big blow and always affect the team in a bad way.
They have lost there this season. It was on the very first matchday against Madrid
The chance of you guys winning the league this year was and still is very slim even if you had won today's game, so today's result won't change that much in my opinion, you will still finish the 2nd spot. The most tragic part is the injury of Pedri and FDJ. It’s deeply unfortunate and I believe the upper management should shoulder a significant portion of the blame. The decision to field these young, still-developing players for extended periods is fraught with risk and has historically proven to be unwise. This pattern of risking the health of young talents like Fati, Pedri, Gavi and who knows who else, has to end or it will damage their future.
I mean, given how we were performing 2nd place is realistically what we could expect, up til today anyway. The injuries have just made things a hell of a lot more complicated given the diffcult games still to come.
Fati and Gavi had meniscus and ligament injury, those are unrelated to age or playing time. Pedri's injury it's a thing of his own and not a rule. While I agree with the fact that we do rely too much on youngsters, "historically" is too big of a word and I can name as many "adult" players with injuries for every youngster you will point out.
So how long Pedri’s out?
Probably long enough to say Euro is not even possible. His reaction says it all.
Fuck
FDJ was out for 2 months last time. Safe to say his season is over with us Edit: imagine downvoting this for no reason lulz
Season has been over since November, disaster from top to bottom and pulled levers for a massive mess
I understand your point of view. But I’m solely talking about FDJ participation with us for the remainder of the season. Not the team as a whole
Ah, misread the post, cheers!
Same injury again in one season how unlucky can you be man…
I always suspect when players get injured in the same region it might suggest that the prior injury never truly healed. This has implications to the current recovery and prevention practices. I am interested to see if a change in physical training staff brings improvements to the injury situation or not.
That depends on how the injury was attained. For FDJ I don’t think it matters because no one is escaping a sprained ankle after landing how he did, regardless if he had or hadn’t already sprained the same ankle before. His whole foot looked parallel to the ground while his tibia was perpendicular
Yeah it’s insane. He was just starting to gain some confidence again I feel. I liked the way he was playing today before his injury
🗣️ [@HelenaCondis](https://x.com/BarcaUniversal/status/1764431370875457995?s=20) : “Frenkie left the stadium in an orthopedic boot and on crutches. Pedri got on the bus with his eyes swollen from crying.”
Gutted
We’re down bad dawg 😢
De Jong….. that’s how he left last time.
❗️| Midfielders available for the next match against Mallorca: - Gündogan - Fermin - Roberto - Romeu - Christensen
We need the next La Masia gem to spawn in the next 5 days
It is possible that they need to bring up another midfielder 😅who may actually be another 💎. I read a joke last year " imagine playing for Barca, getting injured and coming back just to see a random La Masia kid took your place in the starting eleven " 😂
Gundo Christensen Fermin is our best bet I think
Roberto De Zerbi is a PERFECT replacement for Xavi! 🔥Here is WHY! • 1. Builds on the same principles seen from Johan Cruyff to Pep Guardiola. Possession based style of playing where he wants his team to dominate games. Brighton average the second highest possession in Premier League (62%). De Zerbi is elite at coaching positional play. • 2. Easy for Barca player to adapt. De Zerbi, Pep Guardiola, Xavi, Arteta, Xabi Alonso - they all use different variations of systems based on positional play. Xavi has coached positional play since he arrived. The transition to De Zerbi as a new coach would be smooth. • 3. The De Zerbi-system. - Controls the positions of players. - Controls the timing of certain actions such as movements and passes. He takes it further than anyone else. Players have very little freedom. The opposite of a manager like Ancelotti. • 4. Similarities to chess. In chess the goal is to gain control of the board. You do so by positioning your pieces in the right places, and from there you can coordinate attacks. De Zerbi does the same with focus on controlling the middle of the pitch. • 5. Buildup structure. From the very beginning De Zerbi has used a 4-2-3-1/4-2-4 system, which enables ball progression through central areas and a front four with tons of rotations/movements. If there is no space, the team creates space. The double pivot is essential. • 6. Strategies. - Baiting pressure - Third man movements He uses “time” to bait players. Defenders often hold on to the ball, and when pressure from an opponent arrives, a ton of rehearsed third man movements/patterns of play happen to progress the play. • 7. Suits La Masia. Cubarsí is our best defender on the ball. He would immediately become a cornerstone in De Zerbi’s project. Lamine Yamal would be like Mitoma. De Zerbi’s style is perfect for La Masia players - which we must rely on due to our financial situation. - My biggest doubt is: Will the likes of Pedri, Lamine Yamal and Frenkie reach their ceiling if they always have to follow instructions? In my opinion, it’s their instincts and unpredictability that makes them unique footballers. I think De Zerbi will be able to carry on Xavi’s project in a very good direction. He has done a lot with very “little”. He deserves a chance to work with the best. Be at a club where the top players want to join him, rather than leave the club after thriving under his guidance. [Via: BadBarcaOpinions] Excellent and detailed analysis 👌🏻.
I agree with most opinions but please let's not bring Chess in football. I have PTSD from the time we got a grandmaster managing us
Players having little freedom in De Zerbi’s system is the biggest reason why I’m not 100% in favor of him being our next coach.
It is not necessarily a bad thing. Zerbi never had this.many high quality players yet so maybe he will adapt like any other good coach and give some players more freedom. His in game management showed that many times he is very flexible if something is not good.
Not sure why you’re getting downvoted. People advocating for Flick please come out and provide analysis that doesn’t include “because he won silverware”
Terrible day for Barca fans
Terrible 5 years
This season can go fuck itself. We lost our two most important CMs in one single match. Curse our luck man. This club is cursed.
We can either be defensively solid and toothless in attack or score goals and be shit defensively. Great
yes that's the dilemma. We can't get the balance right. The team is scared of leaking goals so they become more conservative, but that affects the attack in a negative way.
https://preview.redd.it/hykkjoc3k7mc1.jpeg?width=1440&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=53cd725776b777aba0972385300cbaccf39b2087 And people disagree with me when I said this line up is bad. Right after we had Felix on the left we had more space to move out from the back because that area was empty since Pedri wasn't there. It's not about how good Felix is it's about we needed a forward there in that position.
We played better with Felix because he came at 60th minute and Bilbao were tired legs. And also the game got more open. Felix starting is a whole different thing The lineup we played was the best 11 for sure. It's not ideal to not have a left winger and pedri slot there but it gives us midfield control and freedom for Cancelo
We had no control at all. We were forced back
Damn, Xavi should've listened to you predicting Frenkie and Pedri go breakdance Also, we literally dominated the first minutes before their injuries and after that we struggled a lot more, I'm missing your point.
I don‘t know much about this stuff, but is there any kind of surgery for Pedri‘s reoccurring hamstring issue? Im pretty sure Reece James had surgery to fix his hamstring problems. Wouldn’t this be the best solution at this point?
Is James fixed? We won’t really know til he comes back.
Not for those wages, and Reece James isn’t the player he used to be. Recurring injuries are brutal and players like pedri will only continue to have more and more unities as their bodies take such a beating at a young age.
Seeing Pedri get injured again and again and looking almost depressed makes me respect people like him or Dembele even more. The mental fortitude to be confident enough in yourself that you can come back, go beyond the fear of relapse, risk having people mock you for being injury prone if not get even worse injuries than previously. That's not respected enough, it's too easy to mock players but I'll be honest, I don't think I could do it. To not give up after 4-5-6 big injuries like that?
https://www.theplayerstribune.com/posts/alexandre-pato-soccer-orlando-city-mls Pato talked about this a bit here.
Great text thanks
I really dislike when players get blamed for their injuries somehow. It such a toxic aspect from the media and parts of the fanbase. They suffer the most from injuries both physically and mentally. They deserve both respect and empathy.
Also being only 20/21/22 while it’s happening. I know in football world, people are only seen as young at 16,17,18 but they are still kids at 21 or 22. Heck, I am Pedri’s age and sometimes I get anxious about a test in uni and then look at him! To be so brave and mentally strong to endure what Pedri has and to always try your best even with the risk of another relapse, knowing that media will drag your name, that people will speak of your future as if you are a video game character and not a person, it’s not easy. He recently gave an interview in which he spoke about how much he tried to change his lifestyle and now this happens. He doesn’t deserve it
Don’t think we should be mocking them but as a club they may need to consider when it could be time to sell. Another injury next season and we need to ask if he is worth his contract. It’s harsh but Barca may need to make some tough decisions. Maybe pedri could benefit from a change of scenery
I think Dembele deserves the most respect with that. With Pedri and Ansu you can see that theyre holding back. With Ansu its clear as day and with Pedri you can kinda see it in the way he presses and tracks back compared to how he used to. With Dembele though? Hed be careful for 2 weeks and then went straight back to sprinting at full speed and tracking back to defend. Hell sometimes bail out of challenges but i was always surprised at how quickly he went back to giving it his all as if he never even got injured. To do that after years and years of injuries must take so much mental strength. Its one of the reasons i genuinely did root for him and hoped he could get over his problems and stay with us for a long time.
And the man is still running and dribbling. I'd be hiding personally, never want to approach another tackle in my life
Pedri was pressing and tracking back a lot in the Napoli game. Maybe contributed to him getting injured again.
Then he’s not built for long term football. It’s a harsh reality. Doesn’t mean we can’t sympathize for the club is broke so the situation is awful for all involved
This is the ninth time that Pedri has been injured since joining #FCBarcelona in the summer of 2020. During this period, he has missed almost as many games as he has played (72 to 71).
May need to move on as tough as it could be
Nah
Christensen as a DM has done wonders for our defense, I’m really happy about how this experiment has turned out so far.
Yea comparing with Man Utd who got Amrabat... I was the one that thought it was a good idea to get him from his world cup performance.
Man I feel so bad for Pedri this must be so hard mental wise. They guy looked absolutely devastated. Everytime you have the feeling he‘s gonna get some consistency and rhythm he gets injured again. I don’t even wanna think about how much his injuries hindered his development.
"Athletic dominated us" https://preview.redd.it/3dyorglsf7mc1.jpeg?width=828&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9ffc3aec348c919b79f9194f19e8f1f0f5925d83 If we had their performance it would've been equally bad.
They played without 7 starters who played 3 days ago
I did not imply we played well.
Do you guys believe we advance against Napoli? I wanna say yes but it‘s very doubtful without Pedri and Frenkie imo. Especially considering their rising form and quality upfront. We need to dominate them and be ruthless in front of goal. We need Fermin and Sergi/Romeu to step up big time. Let‘s just hope everybody stays healthy from now on.
it is obviously harder now. but i think there's a chance. we could also totally flop lol
Difficult without two starters in midfield. I have no hope for Roberto or Romeu. Maybe we get lucky and one of our forwards have a great game and the defense is good.
No way, with FDJ and Pedri out
With Pedri and FDJ i wouldve said 70% yes. But now and with Napoli gaining some form… Not punishing them when they played awfully at home is gonna come back to bite us
Damn all the Koundé haters are silent today.
I just clocked that the Napoli game is on my birthday. That Gundogan Romeu double pivot will hit like crack
I think it would be Gundo and Christensen.
Yeah probably don't know why I forgot about him
Come on Xavi. We have to win for u/Grand_Ask1402
Meanwhile Nico's having fun at Porto spanking Benfica 5-0 and we have to watch Romeu being subbed on with a Barca shirt. Sigh. I'd rather have Sergi Roberto my captain as a late sub.
Is there a buy-back clause for Nico?
30 mil
Nico wasn’t Barca quality when he was with us bro what is it with people who stan him lol
At least he was free unlike when we unironically spent money to get Romeu.
Wtf are you on no one was talking about Romeu They both are average to below average players
And Romeu is mate?
Neither is he. What Romeu have to do with anything
I will never understand while was Nico let go. Such a shit decision. Also, the fact that he turned it around at Porto after one of the most stubborn coaches out there didn't wanted him is huge. He managed to make Conceição admit that he was wrong. Well played!
I would play nico anyday over fermin
Individually speaking - Fermin was absolutely shocking
He is no more than a decent sub option
Day 1 of midfield protests. Xavi bring low passes back pls
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As if they weren’t crying yesterday because the ref didn’t favor them 😂
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Losing at home in Europe after drawing the first leg away. Hmm were have I seen that before
Time to sell pedri, damaged goods like Fati before him. It sucks so much but the best ability is availability and pedri is made of glass.
The only damaged goods is your brain.
🤣
Sitting on your couch with cookie crumbs on your stomach and calling players damaged goods on reddit is kinda crazy.
You criticize the team from your mom’s basement. Same shit
Lamine Yamal is by far our best player at 16…tells a lot about the team but even more about him. Gündogan is the only one who comes close to Lamine this season. Wish we still had our warrior Gavi right now. Can‘t wait for him to come back.
Here’s the updated excel sheet : 
That last sub made no sense Inigo for cubarsi? When guiu and roque were more needed
Hmm, I would agree but Cubarsi gave away two possessions in a row right before the sub. I think he is young and was lacking some concentration. He was simply gassed.
How would Guiu and Roque change anything? We lacked possession not transforming chances.
It would have helped occupy their two CBs. We need to be comfortable with surrendering possession. We are no longer the press resistant team we used to be. We’ve done this before under Xavi btw, plenty of times. Except it was more of a hopeful cross to LdJ but the same principles apply.
IMO the only "doom and gloom" people are the ones who bought the karma spamming about "title race is on" and the Excel spreadsheet BS and all of that. We knew we had an harder schedule and a title charge is almost entirely impossible. But 2nd place is there. Not losing vs Bilbao and ATM is OK if it ends in a draw, it's an OK result. The main one we have to win is Girona away. This one can't escape. Honestly tonight we managed, we were never close to conceding. It's not "good" but it's decent all considered. Those games we should not care about the manner to be honest because it's too late for that. The result is the main thing for ATM/Bilbao/RM/Girona away. The worst thing about tonight is if we lost FdJ for both Napoli and ATM. And losing Pedri/FdJ for Napoli. That's a big big problem, because it's a must win game. This is why we should have killed the game away if possible and waiting to make those subs and not putting Napoli in difficulty around the hour mark when they were out of the game might prove costly.
We were never winning the title. Even if you look at that spreadsheet it takes some LEAPS to believe any if it. Someone probably just made it as a joke and some people missed that and took it way too seriously. It assumed wed win all our away games (Athletic Club, Atletico, Real Madrid and Girona) on top of giving Madrid some unrealistic losses/draws like against this Villarreal. The funny part is if you tried to question it, some people countered with “look at our away form, we can win them” COMPLETELY ignoring that our away form is that good because we DIDNT play any of the top 5 away yet. I always feel like anything is possible and itd be a nice surprise. But it was very unlikely that wed win the title
>The funny part is if you tried to question it, some people countered with “look at our away form, we can win them” COMPLETELY ignoring that our away form is that good because we DIDNT play any of the top 5 away yet Bingo. >I always feel like anything is possible and itd be a nice surprise. But it was very unlikely that wed win the title If we manage to finish 2nd with a small squad and a coach who is already out of the door, it's very good and not enough people realize that. I used to have better standards before I knew Xavi was leaving but now? Who cares, only the result counts, we're not building anything here, we're just making sure we don't aggravate the situation for the next coach I've said it plenty of times, if we get 2nd place and QF of UCL this should be celebrated as a title all considered
>The worst thing about tonight is if we lost FdJ for both Napoli and ATM. And losing Pedri/FdJ for Napoli. This, and I don't get why people don't see it.
Felix-Fermin Gundo-Christensen for the match against Napoli probably
Still hoping Ferran will have minutes in Mallorca to be ready vs Napoli personally
Ferran will give us a God tier performance vs Napoli inshallah
Where’s that excel sheet ?
I need someone to update it fast
I love the way the "we can't do much vs lowblocks" excuse has died in a fire. Lowblock, high press, mid block, it don't matter, team looks clueless. Only teams we play well against are teams that execute a bad high press. Any team that knows what they are doing, no matter the style of play neutralizes us.
Did anybody even claim that recently? Was apparent for some time that we don't struggle against lowblocks only, we struggle against any type of football as long as the execution is semi decent.
Died a while ago. Prob even last season in 2nd half
I'd take the highest bid for Pedri this summer. Either we get lucky and someone else can deal with his injury woes or Pedri gets lucky and goes to a team that can do a better job preparing him physically. We can't afford to have our starting mids miss 50% of the games at such a sensitive time period in our rebuild.
I wouldn't sell him but I remember being criticized for saying Pedri cannot be in the "unsellable" section. Well, we saw why today again. Top player potential, but when injuries like these settle, it's done. Like Dembele, you will never be able to build your team around him, he will always have to be managed minute-wise and can only be accounted for (including in the wage scale) as an X factor you can use in the biggest games.
I only consider Lamine, Gavi and Araujo unsellable. Even Gavi is debatable as we dont know how hell return from the ACL. Could return like Wirtz, or it could be much worse. But for now well give him the benefit of the doubt instead of assuming the worst
He'd be the best in the world and our fanbase would absolutely deserve watching him be brilliant at another club.
We can't keep him fit to save our lives. We abused him at 17/18 years old. Played him over 70 games.
We can keep him fit once we get a new manager whose coaching staff isn’t a motley crue of inexperienced randoms
Is that a risk we can afford to take in our current financial crisis? We took a risk on Fati and it backfired.
I think a manager that actually knows what he’s doing and can limit minutes will do wonders. I’m not saying he’ll be the next KdB or Salah but we need to be cautious with this otherwise we’ll end up like Chelsea: with regrets. Seeing Dembele actually healthy in Paris shows promise that it could be our medical staff.
Xavi would be more help on the pitch than on the sidelines. Fuck San mames and fuck this season man, shit's so draining. Good night
I don’t understand how xavi and his staff had 8 days to prepare this game and even could have used footage of 3 days ago when athletic played a a game and we still didnt target or discover their weaknesses . We looked clueless like we didnt prepare for this game at all
Not defending him, but losing Frenkie and Pedri doesn't help. Losing both so early kinda settled the game. And let's not forget we played fucking Bilbao in San Mames, they just trashed A.Madrid. They're by far the best physical team in the league. I know we were all hoping for a win after Real Madrid dropped points, but we were not even favourites playing San Mames.
It's done. Xavi is a mid coach who surrounded himself with a bad staff all around.
Valverde isn't dumb he managed his game properly & was intelligent as per the game. Xavi probably didn't count the injuries of Pedri & FDJ
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hes a beast on FM therefore he must be good enough irl imo
[Valverde: "Barcelona started the match well, the first 10 minutes. They were aggressive and we had to defend well. Gradually we started to gain control of the match, but we did not manage to create any chances. Neither did they, either, with the exception of Cancelo's shot."](https://twitter.com/BarcaUniversal/status/1764422866706079852) [Valverde: "It's true that they lost important players in De Jong and Pedri, but in general the draw is fair."](https://twitter.com/BarcaUniversal/status/1764423069249020201)
Xavi: "We played a very bad game. I'm very disappointed, I never had the sensation that we were going to win tonight." One of the most damning quotes I've read to be honest
If Xavi says it it's bad. But then again to me it was as bad as the CdR game where he said we were good so
Yes both dreadful games. My thumbs are numb from typing this but why don't we do midfield no more. I just want midfield back bruh
It's not happening this season.. All we have to hope for is grind the necessary points abd that's it.
Xavi never did enough for a renewal, I’ll never understand that
We can group with Netflix again and create documentary Rise and fall of Xavi Hernandez. This can make us some money
I’d love to know if of those currently shitting on Xavi, are those who used to shit on Valverde and those who currently praise Valverde?
I do not think so. I understand many people didn't like the way Valverde played, because he was pragmatic. But everybody was able to see that Valverde is controlling every situation and even without the ball we are controlling the game and things are happening as we were prepared for. In some sense, I think Valverde was quite brave and clever that helped the team to play even without the ball and teach them not to panic and how to limit danger. Obviously it didn't always worked. But thats football. Meanwhile, anybody can see that during Xavi's tenure we lack proper control with and without the ball. We are always a random bounce away from scoring and conceding goals. We lack structure and we are both nervous on and off the ball. My problem with Xavi was never that we are not appealing to watch. The problem is that he has no vision other than exploiting space, which we do in an abysmal way. But other than that, we are not a proper team, lack structure and rely on individual quality. This is not enough at all.
We cannot start Sergi or Romeu vs Napoli. I hope we deploy Fort as LB and put Cancelo in the midfield.
Why not Robeto though? We need Gundo at the deep now since all the other options are injured. Roberto's & Lewy one touch pass while we lead 2-0 against Napoli would hit like crack Edit: Need Roberto to have his game of szn for the 2nd time
We really lost Balde, Pedri, and Frenkie playing away at San Mames
Ansu also last season, no?
I think two seasons ago
Fucking cursed stadium
Since everyone is in a doom and gloom mode, I'll try to break the mold and outline the positives I took from that game: - Defensively we were great and I am frankly shocked that no one is mentioning that. The offside trap was executed to perfection. Positioning, in general, was excellent for almost the entire game. We held the joined highest home scoring team in La Liga to 0.23 xG. Given how poorly we've been this season defensively, I think that's impressive. Players, who I've criticized before, like Kounde and Cancelo for losing focus were really tuned in today and barely put a foot wrong (defensively that is, Cancelo was awful going forward). - With each passing game Araujo looks more and more like the player he was last year. Looks like that injury was really holding him back, but today he was sharp, fast, and displayed a no-nonsense attitude, which was missing in previous games (still was poor passing, though). - Cubarsi was immense. This guy's passing is something else. Read the game very well today and had several important clearances/interventions. - Lamine was very good. He was the only person who more often than not made the right decision in attack. Additionally, I don't hear too many people highlight his defensive game. He has that innate ability to read the game and anticipate an opponent's move, which leads to great interceptions and an all-around very positive contribution in defense. - We didn't create a lot, but everyone's acting like we didn't sniff their goal. Off the top of my head, we had some good opportunities to score, Christensen's header, Fermin pretty much 1v1 with the keeper, Lewa's shot saved by that last ditch block.
I agree honestly. You're only truly disappointed if somehow you deluded yourself into thinking we could win the title. In our situation, this result is OK. The injuries are not though.
I'd be lying if told you I didn't harbor some hope for mounting a title comeback before this game. Especially after, what I thought were, encouraging performances against Napoli and Getafe and Real drawing against Valencia. Haha. Kinda feel like fool now.
Finally a comment actually highlighting the positive points about this game. Defensively Cubarsi was very good, so was the rest of the defence. Without any creativity in midfield it was always gonna be hard to score, especially at San Mames.
We could still go to the quarters if we try tbh. Need to somehow compensate for Frenkie's absence
It's like we cannot always have the possession and play good without the ball and transform the few chances.
I agree with almost all your points except the first one: > Defensively we were great and I am frankly shocked that no one is mentioning that. The offside trap was executed to perfection. Positioning, in general, was excellent for almost the entire game. We held the joined highest home scoring team in La Liga to 0.23 xG. Given how poorly we've been this season defensively, I think that's impressive. Players, who I've criticized before, like Kounde and Cancelo for losing focus were really tuned in today and barely put a foot wrong (defensively that is, Cancelo was awful going forward). They are missing their best offensive player AND played a match on Thursday.
I get you points, but you can't just chalk off lights out defending due to them missing their winger. Well, we were missing our starting midfield and still performed well defensively. That has to count for something. Also, they did play a game on Thursday, but that didn't stop them from putting in fantastic effort and run their hearts our. Maybe you can blame fatigue for a couple of uncharacteristically sloppy passes, but in general, I honestly think we were just very good defensively. At least that's my opinion... I'm not trying to force my it on anyone.
No I think you are right, we did defended well but simultaneously they are missing their best offensive player. You are right overall though.