King Eric shows love
The Clasico in Madrid--the first of two that will in all likelihood decide the winner of the Copa del Rey--was played on Wednesday at the Santiago Bernabeu. Again, Madrid struck early and lead the game by one in the first ten minutes, and again, Barça came back and won the game with deft team play in the second half.
Madrid tried a different tack this time (their Barça playbook is getting well weathered at this point with frustrated strategies...). Last month in Madrid they pressed hard and wore themselves out, this time they stayed back and didn't chase but waited for their opportunities on the counter.
Same result.
The only difference was the return of some of the more egregious fouls and nasty play that we'd seen last year in the Supercopa. They get pissed off like Yosemite Sam and start fouling like assholes (the worst coming from Pepe [as usual] who went so far as to stomp on Messi's fingers as he was on the ground from a hit by Callejon). This kind of behavior comes from the top down and as Mourinho gets relentlessly shut down the only strategy that is left to him is brute force and intimidation.
Fuel for the fire
Though Ronaldo scored against Pinto in a strike that would more likely been stopped by Victor Valdes, the game was won for Barça on the strength of two goals scored by defensive backs: Captain Carles Puyol and Eric Abidal.
By opening up the entire squad to the goal and keeping a versatility in roles and relationships, Barça have had five different scorers for their last five goals against los merengues. Continued Voltron shit.
But even in his traditional role as defensive cleaner, Abidal was brilliant. His performance, in the wake of his re-upping his contract with the team, was jubilant. Let's look back at the last year for King Eric: Get diagnosed with cancer, kick cancer's ass, return to the team and score the winner in Copa del Rey qualifiers against Bilbao, play in the Champion's league final and lift the European Cup, re-sign with the Blaugrana, go to Madrid and score the game winner on Wednesday.
Domino!
The Copa del Rey is not really the priority championship that the teams play for. It is less weighted than Champions League and the League itself, but it was all that Madrid could console themselves with in the last three years (though they dropped it under their team bus while celebrating).
These early months in the calendar year are usually where Barça find themselves in a tricky position, just before they get all cylinders blasting again for the end of the season symphony. Behind by five points in the league, it's time for the superheroes to take charge.
How to foil the evil Professor Frinkle? It's simple really but quite clever.
