As i type this, Barcelona is losing 4 - 0 to Bayern. The Germans have been clinical, cynical & in general, better than Barcelona. Germans identified the Barca dis-advantage on height & took full advantage of it. Bayern were physical & with Victor Kasai allowing good amount of physicality, they took fill advantage. The body check by Muller for fourth goal on Alba was cynical to say the least. And how Javi Martinez survived so long with out card beggars belief.
To focus on main point in this match though. Baverians were worthy winners. They hardly allowed Barca to play till they were leading 3 - 0. There were no serious Barca attacks & mostly the catalans had toothless possession. Bavarians just had better personnel & better tactics.
And this is not the first time this has happened to Barcelona. They were outplayed by Madrid multiple times through the season, Real Sociadad defeated them fair & square. Barca have lost in previous seasons but never been comprehensively outplayed. In this season, they have been multiple times.
Bayern are now for sure in final. Barca are not going to come back from this defeat.
Lots of wake up calls. Messi had close to zero service. There was fear in Barcelona every time Bayern hit ball in the box.
Maybe it is bit pre-mature to say that the Barca era has ended but for me, it has. Maybe they will have new era. But with this set of players, without any major re-inforcements, Barcelona will slide down the table. Due to their financial might, they will not slide down too below but they are on downward trend.
Since 2005, teams have won against Barca but rarely by challenging them in football. This season multiple teams have & won. So it is safe to say that Barca no longer occupy any higher perch.
Even as Barca fan, this saddens me but does not surprise me. After all, what goes up comes down, and this truism is even more applicable for sports where cycles rarely last few years.
No comments:
Post a Comment