Ream Madrid vs Barca Preview

A couple of months back, if someone have told you that the title will mostly be decided at the Bernebeu, you probably might have laughed at him. But tonight's match at the Bernebeu is mostly a make or break match. Simply put this is a match which Real Madrid cannot afford not to win. A victory at home will see Barca's lead at top cut to just one point and most importantly will surely be a huge blow to Barca's confidence. But a lose or Draw will make it more tougher for madrid to overcome Barca this season. There were doubts of Henry's participation in the match at Bernebeu. He was reported to have not yet recovered from the blow received from Chelsea's Alex. But Guardiola has included him in the squad which travels to Madrid, but mostly he will not start in the starting eleven. The 19 member squad is Valdés, Jorquera, Henry, Xavi, Piqué, Iniesta, Puyol, Cáceres, Sylvinho, Bojan, Eto'o, Messi, Hleb, Alves, Abidal, Keita, Gudjohnsen, Touré and Sergio Busquets. Barcelona would have ideally rested some of there star players but I doubt Guardiola would do that.

The possibility of Henry starting on the bench puts me in a bit of confusion. Normally Iniesta will move up front, but that makes it easy for Gago and Lassa pair to mark Xavi out of the game. I would have loved if Guardiola took the option of including Pedro in the squad. Eto has been poor in some matches and I would have dropped him for tonight's match. But with no Pedro I doubt that happening. So in all probability we will see Messi pairing with Eto and Bojan upfront. Why i will prefer Bojan ahead of Iniesta is that for tonight's match it is crucial we win the midfield battle hands down. Without Iniesta it will be very difficult. Messi is due to some good showing, Eto has been playing the spoiler in all of Messi's vibrant run. So I will prefer to start with Bojan on centre and Eto on left. The midfield has to be Iniesta - Toure and Xavi. There is no need to rest Toure as he has been fortunate enought to get some rest recently. But the defense still puzzles me. In a normal circumstances, Puyol and Pique should pair in the centre and Alves and Abidal in both side. But for Chelsea match Puyol is suspended and most probably we will start Abidal in centre. So i would love to see Abidal and Pique partnering in the middle and Puyol playing the left-back role.

This is a match which Real Madrid will be desperate to win and that too most probably atleast by a 2 goal margin. FC Barcelona players should use that to their advantage. They should control the midfield cutting Real Madrid of any sizeable possession. Last time when these two teams met, Real Madrid come out with a defensive set of mind. This time they can't afford to do that to Barca. They have to atatck and Iniesta should do well from midfield. Iniesta missed the match at Camp Nou and will be looking to do well at Real Madrid.

Looking Positively To Stamford Bridge

After a day of throwing brick-bats at each other, both Barca and Chelsea fans have slowly settled with the reality of the situation at Ground zero. Even the Spanish and English media are in the same mood - the article by Kevin McCarra in the Guardian is a prime example of that. Chelsea fans after a night of Euphoria has slowly understood the dangers held in the second leg. Barca fans and media after a night of dissappointment has settled to accept the fact that a nil-nil result is not at all a bad result as been made out. There were a bit of dissappointment in the Spanish side after the draw, but that was mainly due to a fear that a repeat of last year was on the cards. Last year Manchester United came to Camp Nou, defended their life out and returned with a goal-less draw; they then won at home to kick Barca out of the Champions League. But then that Barca was different, it was a Barca which was struggling in all fronts and finished third in the league. In that match also Manchester United played the defensive game but was lucky that Barca gave them a oppurtunity to score and Paul Scholes neatly obliged. But this Barcelona side is different as they are on top of their game.

Indeed they were denied by absolute perfect defending by Chelsea. They didn't see many opening but they did create an almost perfect four opening, only to be denied by Cech and a lack of cool heads by their own players. But our midfield, eventhough did not create much opening was perfect in ball possession. People, especially English media will say - "What's there with Ball Possession, if you can't get the goals!". But there were positives to look at Stamford Bridge from the performance of our midfield. Chelsea midfield had Essien, Malouda, Lampard, Obei Mikel and Ballack in their ranks and we had the likes of Iniesta, Xavi and Toure. Out of the three Toure is the only one who has a physical built which could challenge any of those midfielders, but to their credit Barca midfield did creat some trouble for Chelsea, especially Iniesta. Mikel might have kept Xavi quiet from creating chances but not from retaining possession.

The two reason why Barca failed to create much of chances were the decision by Chelsea to lay deep in their half and most importantly a lack of pace. FC Barcelona played the game at a lower pace than they normally used to. This has to be predominantly attributed to the poor game Messi and Eto had. But with the tie remaining at 0-0, we can expect Chelsea to open up a bit towards the end of the second tie. Chelsea's startegy would be the same as the first leg and to neautralise that we have to take extreme caution not to give Cheap balls away to Chelsea at decent positions. If we manage to do that Chelsea eventually had to open up, giving us space to exploit. For what all Chelsea players and English media might claim, in football you have to score goals to win. And that makes the tie evenly poised.

NB: You will here claims from English media and Chelsea players about how they are going to attack Barca at Stamford Bridge. Don't give a damn to those, as we all know they will start playing the same way as in the first leg.

FC Barcelona vs Chelsea Pictures