As the half-time whistle blew at the Nou Camp Tuesday night, serious questions were being asked about Barcelona’s season.
A goal down to Atletico Madrid in the Champions League quarter-final first leg, just three days after losing at home to eternal rivals Real Madrid had put their league title challenge into at least a small amount of doubt, the previously unbeatable were suddenly looking very frail.
It wasn’t just that Barca were losing, they were also playing poorly – just as they had in the last half-hour of their defeat to Zinedine Zidane’s men – and had managed only one shot on target against Atletico’s well-drilled
The narrative that had been gaining momentum over the previous few days – that Barca were physically tired as they near the end of a gruelling season – was starting to look more feasible by the minute.
But a superb second half performance, which saw Atletico concede twice and survive several more close calls, has given the Catalan giants a slender advantage ahead of next week’s second leg at the Vicente Calderon, and shown how foolish we were to even think their season was about to collapse.
There were several factors in Barca’s second-half comeback, and Luis Enrique must take some credit – however he achieved it – for cajoling his team into significantly upping their tempo.
Individuals also shone, with Neymar in particular providing a spark as he twisted and turned and shimmied and feinted on the edge of the Atletico box. The attacking intent of full-backs Jordi Alba and Dani Alves, who each assisted one goal, was also important, while the impetus provided by the full-voiced crowd also helped.
There was another extremely important element, however, and at this point we should remember that Barca didn’t become treble winners last season simply because they are good players.
They are, of course, but that alone is not enough, and good players don’t get anywhere without one essential ingredient: hunger.
These Barcelona players are hungry, make no mistake. They would not, in fact, be such great players without a burning desire to succeed.
Nobody in the Barca team typifies that quality more than Luis Suarez, so it was entirely appropriate that the firebrand Uruguayan played the key role in his team’s victory with both goals.
It hardly needs to be stated that Suarez’s insatiable hunger often leads him to tread a fine line between acceptably competitive and unacceptably aggressive, and he came close to crossing that line with a couple of confrontational incidents last night.
Ultimately, however, he just about did enough to keep his temper in check and take out his aggression on the ball rather than the opposition, especially with the ferociously powerful bullet header which won the game.
There is still a long way to go, of course, both in this tie and the season.
Atletico have every chance of knocking out Barca in next week’s second leg, and even if they don’t there will still be the likes of Real Madrid and Bayern Munich to stand between Luis Enrique’s men and their dream of retaining the Champions League crown.
But if they fail, it certainly won’t be for a lack of determination.
