It has become something of a cliché in the reporting of the Clásico, but the oft-quoted fact that each game played occurs in a particular context – always slightly distinct – rung true enough of this encounter. It was the final game before the last ten, if that makes any sense, and it was always going to mark the season’s final tendencies. It was unlikely to be definitive, a fact on which coaches coincided before the game, but the psychological advantage to be gained was the main motive for winning. The points always come in handy, after all.
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Back in October in the Bernabéu, Madrid were revving up, leaving behind their nervy start and the home defeat to Atlético and banging in goals with some abandon, whilst Barcelona were undefeated, without even conceding a league goal. Nevertheless, you could sense back then that things were not quite right at the Camp Nou, and that Madrid were just getting into gear. Thus it proved, with Barcelona’s 3-1 defeat followed by a 1-0 home loss to Celta, and the subsequent rise and rise of Madrid. Who would have thought, that five months later, Barcelona would be ahead (albeit by a single point) and Madrid would be clinging to the wreckage – mortally wounded by a 4-3 defeat at home to Schalke and a series of unconvincing league displays, set off by the traumatic 4-0 defeat in the Calderón. Carlo Ancelotti, hailed as a genius before Christmas, was now apparently fighting for his job, and Luis Enrique, previously the dead man walking, had recovered his Cheshire-cat grin. Could the Clásico change the direction of the league again, for one last time?
Well it almost did. It seems slightly perverse that Real Madrid should have saved one of their best performances of the season for their visit to hostile territory, but they did. Quite what happened is difficult to analyse, apart from the fact that Barcelona won with two goals, both scored against the run of play. That’s the way it goes, at this level. Luis Suarez is capable of scoring in any circumstances, of changing a game at the drop of a pass, and that’s exactly what happened in the second half. From then on, with Luis Enrique wisely changing Ivan Rakitic and Andres Iniesta for Xavi and Sergio Busquets, the hosts recovered some possession and began to master their tiring opponents, especially when Luka Modric and Isco were taken off.
Can Real Madrid take heart from their performance, despite the fact that it yielded zero points? Probably yes. They were enormously superior in the first half, taking the game to Barcelona and constantly forcing them into poor passes, harassing them with a high line. Jeremy Mathieu’s goal came out of nothing – poorly defended by Madrid and Sergio Ramos in particular, but it didn’t seem to affect the visitors who kept plugging away at the hole in Barcelona’s midriff, a hole caused by Rakitic’s inability to win those loose 50-50 balls that Busquets wins in his sleep. It’s been a long time since Barcelona looked so poor in midfield, with Iniesta and Leo Messi cut off from one another and Madrid dominating possession. Now that Luka Modric is back, Isco has someone who understands him, someone with whom he can associate in order to pause the play, speed it up, or change the direction. Even Cristiano Ronaldo was more involved in the build-ups, and hit the bar from close range after an excellent pass from Benzema, When Ronaldo equalised after a nifty back heel from the Frenchman, you feared for Barcelona. Indeed, had it not been for Claudio Bravo’s excellent tip-over from a Ronaldo shot, the hosts would have been chasing the game in the second half.
The win puts Barcelona four points clear, with 30 points still to contest. As both coaches said, it’s not definitive, and one suspects that the subsequent Champions League games to come might have a say in the final reckoning. I don’t think it’s a case of elimination tipping the balance in favour of the side with 50 percent less to worry about, but rather the opposite. Both sides want to win everything possible, and the treble is still on for Barcelona. The psychological boost given to Barcelona by this Clásico result might be less than it looks, given Madrid’s performance, but good showings in the Champions League will have a benevolent effect on the final league run-in. It also needs to be mentioned that both sides still have to visit Sevilla, a team with their mojo currently working. Any side who can beat Villarreal 2-0 away (having just eliminated them from the Europa League in midweek) must be taken seriously. It also seems a crime not to mention Valencia, who slaughtered Elche 4-0 away on Friday night and who now sit threateningly third, just four points from Real Madrid and eight from the top. At least for the runners-up spot, it’s hardly a yawning chasm.
VINE – Luis Suarez’s goal to take the lead in #ElClasico, the live broadcast angle https://t.co/hBJYsfb9HN
— FanSided GIF (@FanSidedGIF) March 22, 2015
The same can be said for Atletico Madrid, their comfy 2-0 home win against Getafe featuring Fernando Torres’ first La Liga goal for eight years – the last one was way back in 2007 against Nastic. Anyway, the news that they had been drawn against their neighbours in the quarter-finals of the Champions League, a re-enactment of last season’s final – was interesting indeed. Equally interesting is the fact that Barcelona still have to visit them in the league, on the penultimate weekend. If points still matter then, the game could be decisive.
I don’t quite understand the current Barcelona. Xavi and Iniesta no longer form the crux of the side, and so tiki-taka has given way to a slightly more direct approach, based on getting the ball quickly into their fearsome trident of forwards, M&S. As a strategy, this is coherent but slightly risky, especially if the lines of communication are cut or if two-thirds of the trident is out of sorts. In midweek against Manchester City, Leo Messi simply played the game single-handedly, but Manchester City had neither the guile nor the tactical nous to stop him. Real Madrid, on the other hand, had both, and reduced the Argentine’s presence in the Clásico to almost zero, until the final twenty minutes.
Nobody else seemed able to step up and take control for Barcelona. Messi assisted Mathieu with the free-kick, but for much of the game found himself back-pedalling to constantly cover for Dani Alves, who was having trouble keeping Marcelo quiet. In short, I’m not convinced by the present Barcelona set-up, spectacular though it can be when M&S are strutting their stuff. They’re allowed to change style to accommodate their changes in personnel, of course, but it was odd to see the old roles reversed, with Real Madrid insisting on a high-line pressure and retention of possession, and Barcelona playing on the break. In the end, Barcelona had 52 percent of the ball overall, but it didn’t seem like that. The league title is far from decided. This season has had too many twists and turns already to assume that Suarez’s first Clásico goal was the killer blow in the plot. I think that there is plenty of narrative to come.
Two hours before the Clásico I was at Anoeta to see Real Sociedad make it three wins on the trot, 3-1 against a Cordoba side who finished the game with eight men and the unenviable statistic of nine consecutive defeats – despite opening the scoring. Eibar managed to cut their identical run of defeats with a 0-0 draw at struggling Granada, but Cordoba, bottom of the table and managerless after sacking Miroslav Djukic in midweek, are now in danger of nudging the all-time record of straight defeats (eleven), established by Las Palmas in 1960. Whilst some dream of glory, others simply dream of three points. Next week, at home to Atlético and with three of their regular first-teamers red-carded and unavailable, they might just have to keep on dreaming.
