I honestly don’t think there’s a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth to be done here. We’ve got to be a little bit philosophical about it. What we saw last night was a team that is undoubtedly very good beaten by a team that is substantially better, in virtually all departments. They move together as an astonishingly disciplined bloc, they don’t leave great windy spaces anywhere, they don’t let you settle on the ball, and when they break, they break very, very fast. They also have a man who, when he has the ball at his foot, can accelerate away and dribble at speed in a way that’s just unmanageable for the opposing defence. Give him any space, and he’ll use it. Before you know it, he’s left two defenders trailing in his wake, and that pulls the defence out of shape. On the basis of the first half particularly — although in the second half there was a sublime piece of control with the ball almost out of play in our area that probably only he could have done in the world — I see no evidence of any decline in Messi’s powers.
No, really, there’s a bunch of good teams in Europe, and then there are three that, for the time being, are just a cut above the rest.
Now — what can be saved from all this? We were considerably better in the second half, because we upped our tempo. In terms of stats, we finally had almost as many shots as them over the whole match, because of the second half performance. Although they made theirs tell much more. You can also plausibly claim that if Dzeko buries that ball from about five yards out, on his own, it’s potentially a different match. Although I have to say that Barca always looked potentially good for a third goal, even in the second half. The penalty: at 3-1 the return match was a dead rubber. Hart did the business. At 2-1 it’s a long shot, very long, but with Yaya back, it can be done. It would be one hell of a result, but it can be done.
One year ago, we had a man sent off, conceded a penalty, and lost 2-0. This year, we had a man sent off, conceded a penalty, and lost 2-1. Mathematically, you know, that’s marginal progress! More generally, we were made to look ridiculous by Bayern last season at the Etihad, and two seasons back Joe had to pull out a once in a lifetime performance against Dortmund. That’s not happening any more, even against Europe’s very best. The road is long…but we’re on it. Not cheerful about the result, not glossing over it. I really did think we could beat them, this time. But we’ve played some dogshite matches this season, in and out of Europe. This wasn’t one of them.
