Inter vs Barca Preview - The Italian Job

Inter Looks To Stop FC Barcelona from reaching Bernabeu

FC Barcelona will travel to Milan by road after UEFA insisted that the Semi-Finals should gon on despite the disruption of air traffic. San Siro will play host to the first leg of the high profile clash between Spanish Champions Barca and Italian Champions Inter Milan. FC Barcelona has the definite advantage of playing the second leg at home. But Barca should not forget about what happened to Chelsea last season and in this season also. Inter Milan was the one who booted Chelsea out of the competition eventhough they had to play the second leg at Stamford Bridge. Jose Mourinho will be expecting his players show the same spirit as they have displayed against Chelsea. Inter Milan comfrotably saw off Juventus in their weekend fixture whereas FC Barcelona were held to an away draw against Espanyol. Jose Mourinho would have been studying the FC Barcelona vs Espanyol match and would have already come up with some tactics to stop this Barca brigade. The last time these two teams met was in the group stage and FC Barcelona won that one comfortably - FC Barcelona -2, Inter - 0

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Joan Laporta, Man who Brought Glory back to Barca

Joan Laporta will step down as the president of FC Barcelona at the end of this seaosn. He oversaw one of the most successful period of the club, successful in all aspects. When Joan Laporta took over as Barca President in the summer of 2003, the club was lying at the sixth place in the league, missing the Champions League action and was trophyless since 1999. Coming to the end of his tenure, Barca has already won 11 trophies, has a chance to add two more and has once again the most feared and respected football club in the planet. Many may argue that Laporta was plain lucky to ovesee such a golden period. But I firmly believe that Success is a result of constant struggle, not of any accident. And Indeed Laporta struggled. Halfway through his first season, Barca lied in the mid-way position in League table. Fans were calling for the sacking of Frank Rijkaard, laporta's chosen one. Credit must be given to Laporta for continuing with Rijakaard and he soon turned the fortunes of Barca upside down.

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FC Barcelona vs Deportivo Hightlights

FC Barcelona - 3, Deportivo - 0

FC Barcelona took a firm step towards retaining their La Liga crown with a comfortable 3-0 victory over visiting Deportivo La Coruna side. First half goal from Bojan and two second half strikes from Pedro and Toure helped Barca increase their lead on top to six points. Real Madrid who play tonight could cut that lead back to three. Guardiola went with the 4-2-3-1 formation for this encounter. The defense had Alves, Marquez, Pique and Maxwell infront of Valdes. Xavi and Toure paired infront of the defense and infront of them Jeffren, Messi and Pedro lined up. Bojan remained ahead of Messi as a sole striker. Sometimes I feel keeping Xavi so far behind the pitch would hamper his effectiveness, but the little maestro is proving me again and again.

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Vicente del Bosque can No Longer Ignore Valdes

My last post on Valdes and Spanish National Team ended with a hope that Valdes somehow manages to get into the World Cup squad. How things have changed drastically. When I wrote my previous post I was conviced that Del Bosque was never going to pick Valdes for Spain. Such has been Valdes' performance since my post, Vicente del Bosque can no longer overlook Valdes for the World Cup squad. Last week's El Clasico saw Valdes comfortably seeing off any danger from one of the most attacking teams in La Liga. Prior to that we saw some exceptionally solid acts against the likes of Arsenal and a host of Spanish side. Valdes has been always considered as an error-prone keeper, hence it is quite surprising that I can't remember the last mistake he did. Yes, he has been playing in an error-free way for some time, completely unlike the Valdes we know. Hence it is no surprise that he is leading the Zamoras list by a comfortable margin.

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