FC Barcelona vs Real Madrid – LaLiga - El Clasico Review – May 6, 2018

A Clasico, where, FC Barcelona stood up to Real Madrid, in every aspect.

FC Barcelona vs Real Madrid – LaLiga - El Clasico Review – May 6, 2018

Warning: This a review which is 100% biased to FC Barcelona 

Coming to the final Clasico of this season, it was off little significance to both teams as Barcelona had already been crowned the Spanish champions and Real Madrid apart from being in the upcoming Champions League finals, are fighting for the second spot with Atletico in La Liga. So as Valverde had put it - “Clásico will be 'decaffeinated', we've already won". But it turned out to be anything but decaffeinated.

It started with a needle between the managers. Despite being Champions, Zidane and Co refused to give Barca the traditional guard of honor siting that they were not given the same when they won the Club World Cup. Valverde had refused to do it in the last Clasico because he was of the view that Barca need to give it only if they had participated in the said tournament.

The Camp Nou was a spectacle with a riot of the traditional Catalan club colors of Blue, Red and Yellow. It was Andres Iniesta’s last Clasico as he led his team against Real, for one last time.  Both the managers fielded their full strength team and it was action from the word go. Both teams were bent on attacking and it was end to end to stuff.

Barcelona opened the score as Luis Suarez gave a long pass to Sergi Roberto on the right and ran up. Messi  too rushed forward in between the two, tracked by the defenders of Real. Instead of Messi, Sergi gave a perfect looping cross to Suarez, on the left , whose fantastic finish gave Barcelona the lead. 

Real Madrid hit back in a couple of minutes as  Kroos found Ronaldo in the Barca box, who back heeled the ball back to him. Kroos crossed it to Benzema whose header was tapped in by the on rushing Ronaldo despite the efforts of Pique to block him. Both Ronaldo and Pique took a heavy knock, each. Madrid was more dominant for a period of time as Ronaldo had a number of good chances and the ever solid Ter Stegen was up to the task. In the meantime Luis Suarez and Alba failed to convert inch perfect crosses from an inspired Messi.

Then the game started to get ugly. Heavy tackles were followed by almost all the 4 defenders of Real Madrid getting booked. Something that Modric said made Jordi Alba angry and there was lot of pushing and shoving as Alba got away with his unnecessary reaction.

With Madrid being more physical and aggressive, Barcelona became more defensive. But Bale was absolutely awful in defense as he hacked down Iniesta much to the annoyance of the Barca crowd and team. As the game headed towards half time, Luis Suarez and Sergio Ramos were involved in another silly altercation. It ended with both being booked. Iniesta and Messi argued with the Referee for Suarez.

Then something happened which was rarely witnessed in the Camp Nou. Messi tracked back to Sergio Ramos and tackled him. It was not a very heavy tackle but Ramos went down so dramatically that the referee gave a rare yellow card to the angry, little Argentine. He didn’t seem to bother. For once he showed Ramos who the Boss was and the Camp Nou loved every bit of it, from their talisman.

Gareth Bale got away as he hit Alba heavily followed by a heavy booted challenge on Umtiti. In the meantime, Marcelo shoved Sergi Roberto despite him not having the ball and the young man raised up his fist in anger as if to slap Marcelo. Marcelo went down clutching his face in pain and the Referee brandished the red card, sending off Sergi, reducing FC Barcelona to 10men. Replays showed that Sergi had gestured but stopped short from hitting Marcelo and Marcelo with his overreaction fooled the referee into sending him off. As they left the field at half time, cameras caught Ramos and Marcelo smiling and winking at each other, on a job well done.

It was very clear that the 2^nd half was not going to be pretty and Real Madrid had the upper hand as Barcelona would have to play the  entire 45 minutes with one man less. With the Champions League in mind and against 10 men Barca, Zidane sent in Asensio for Ronaldo while for Barca Semedo came in for Countinho.

Madrid were on attack mode from the start. But the calm Busquests and Rakitic were more solid than ever as they managed to dispossess the Madrid players and build moves for Barca with the lightning Semedo managing to go forward to support Messi and Suarez. Suddenly Barcelona were on the offensive. 

Much against expectations, they started attacking with more vigour. Suarez got the ball after a rough tackle on Varane (which saw protests from the Madrid Players)  and passed it on to Messi. Messi, with the burly Real defenders around him, danced his way into the Madrid Box and sent in a lovely curling, left footer, without even looking up, which gave Barcelona the lead. With the crowd completely behind then, they were on the front foot and had Madrid on the ropes. Messi was everywhere giving Navas nightmares.

Soon Paulinho was substituted for Iniesta. The whole stadium stood up applauding their departing Don as he gave the Captain’s armband to Messi and walked off, applauding back at his beloved fans. 

As the game progressed, a beautiful cross from Semedo found Paulinho but his effort was thwarted by a defiant Navas. Madrid continued with their physical game as Ramos made a couple of rough tackles. But the referee ignored them and got on with the game. Then Madrid scored from a counter. Asensio gave a great cross to Bale who finished with a fantastic , curling effort leveling it at 2-2.

With the scores level, Madrid started to attack. Marcelo was fouled by Alba and he went down in the Barca box. But this time the referee just waved play on, much to his annoyance (lol).  It became more physical as the game progressed as Bale was finally booked for a foul on Semedo. In the meantime, Navas brought out a couple of top notch saves from Messi who could have done better.  Suarez injured himself with a fall but Real Madrid refused to put the ball out and played on. It was finally sent out by a furious Paulinnho who gave the over enthusiastic Vasquez a piece of his mind.  The match finally ended in a 2-2 draw with Barcelona still unbeaten in La Liga, this season.

The major talking points:

There was an underlying anger on both sides. While one was angry about their lost League title, the other one was fuming over their pathetic Champions League exit. It spilled out into the playground leading to many unnecessary events.

Ramos and Marcelo managed to get into the minds of the Barca players. Their over reactions, resulted in the Referee being fooled. He readily brandished cards for the Barca players and wrongly sent off Sergi Roberto. To make up for that, he did even worse in the second half as he ignored the fouls from both sides and let play continue.

While Madrid was determined to break the winning streak of Barcelona, Barca were determined not to lose it. Ramos and Marcelo almost made it impossible for Barcelona. But every Barca player stuck to their task and put in a real shift. Pique in particular was extremely effective at the back. Raktic was determination personified as he gave one of his best performances of this season. Luis Suarez and Lionel Messi were like men possessed not ready to give an inch. They were the best players by a mile for the amount of work they put in and the determination with which they carried on, despite the setbacks and heavy tackles. 

Barcelona, unlike their earlier performances, stood up to the bullies of Real Madrid and returned in kind. It ended in a draw but it showed the fighting qualities of a team that was down to 10 men and yet took the game to their opponents.

Real Madrid were crying hoarse over a penalty not given for a foul on Marcelo (well he got the Oscar for over action in the 1^st half, by getting Sergi sent off. You can’t expect a 2^nd one, even if the tackle was for real.)  and that Varane was fouled before the 2^nd Barca goal. But Gareth Bale, who scored the 2^nd Madrid goal, was let off for a red card offence, while Sergi did not deserve a straight red card. Similarly the wonderful Rakitic was wrongly ruled offside for what could have been a 3^rd Barca goal. Ramos definitely got away with some heavy tackles, despite being booked. Thus the points of protest were evened out.

There was no need for any guard of honor from Real Madrid to the newly crowned Laliga champions. FC Barcelona took it from them through their courageous and fighting game. It was remarkable that Barca managed to hold off Real Madrid with 10men. In fact they could have actually won the game.

 In the end, a happy FC Barcelona celebrated their becoming the Spanish Champions in front of their adoring supporters while Real Madrid were caught out in their own game.

The images that stood out were:

A sad yet smiling Iniesta, walking off the Camp Nou amidst all the love and adulation and dancing around, bare foot, with his team mates in the end.

In the midst of all the acrimony, the usually outspoken Pique kept his calm and went about his job in a disciplined manner. He took a heavy knock but never wavered and kept up the great work till the very end. It was a regal performance from the big guy. He also managed to arrange a guard of honour for the Barcelona team with the help of the Barca staff which was a clever alternative. He would always be the towering Boss.

Messi, sitting and smiling happily, despite his efforts being stopped by Navas.  He knew he had Madrid at his feet and he was enjoying it thoroughly. He showed the biggies of Real Madrid who was the actual Big One in the match. It was the angry Messi in the first half and he went completely nuts in the 2nd half. Its always an adorable spectacle to watch when Leo Messi goes crazy. He was on his knees most of the time as he ran his heart out in the second half. He simply stamped his dominance all over Camp Nou.

My personal experience:

I always believe that any sports needs to be played with the right spirit and sportsmanship. I have always been proud that Barcelona have tried and followed these principles of Cryuff in the most trying situations.

This season, as usual, Barcelona had to endure a lot of physical teams like Atletico Madrid, Real Madrid, Valencia, Espanyol etc - who were given a lot of leeway by the referees. All Barca would do was to complain and protest loudly to the referee. Some of them do resort to play acting to get their way against rough teams. But Barcelona rarely gave it back. 

In this game, deep down, there was a personal satisfaction when Barcelona gave it back to the likes of Marcelo and Sergio Ramos. The Barca attitude came as a surprise for Madrid and their faithful fans.

(My mother who at times watches the Barca games with me, was appalled at how roughly Barcelona were tackling their opponents. I had to show her in the replays as to what Sergi actually did and how much Marcelo overreacted. She couldn’t believe that Messi wantedly brought down Ramos and again it took some time for her to understand that Ramos had gone down dramatically on a light touch from Messi who was actually aiming more for the ball. But till the end, she never approved of it, despite Madrid bringing down Barca players regularly. For her Barcelona are made of nice guys who take everything in their stride, get up every time they are hit and continue to play as usual. I do agree with her that it was not right. But I was somehow not feeling bad.)

I don’t endorse this kind of tit for tat behavior but at times it feels very good to give it back to the ones who deserve it. In the face of adversity, 10 men Barcelona were at their fighting best and in the end it was nice to see them come out of the tough situation, without losing. It was after all a draw but it felt like a huge win.

In the middle of the night, just like the Barca team celebrating joyously, I was dizzy with joy. I couldn’t sleep and was tweeting ferociously. I had one angry Madrid Fan asking me if it was ok to punch an opponent in football and my reply was “It’s definitely right to punch back, when you get punched.”

And Barcelona, for once, punched back when they got punched. Real Madrid could have no complaints. It was after all their way of playing.

Vamos Barca! Forca Barca.