Barcelona 0-0 ManUtd: Villains and Heroes

April 26, 2008

Barcelona 0-0 ManUtd: Villains and Heroes Paul James

Sometimes the fates conspire against you. I had already ducked out of work next week because of Tuesday’s home leg and could not really do the same for the away leg. So instead of soaking up the atmosphere in the Catalan capital I find myself at a Management Centre in Hampshire.

I organise my day around being free at 7.45, and leave the others at dinner. I’ve got the team selection on text, and it’s worrying; Vidic out with a stomach upset, Ji Sung Park in, Scholes and Carrick but no Anderson. I rate Hargreaves as a stand-in right back, and the rest look good until I realise he has moved them all round; Tevez in support, Ronny as striker, Rooney on the wing.

The TV is not on. Is nobody watching the football? “Sky is down. Don’t worry, sir, we can rig up the television in the Arden Suite.” I go there. The place takes ten minutes to find and is deserted. I’m becoming Mr Nasty; I don’t need Sky next week, sunshine, I need it now. I run down to the pub. Nice bar, nice beer. Big telly, no Sky.

Why do they run conferences in the middle of fucking Hampshire? I run back (it’s only a quarter of a mile) and am reduced to sitting in my car listening to Alan Green and Chris Waddle on Five Live over eighty minutes of torture.

From them I get the impression we are utterly awful, that it is a miserable display, that our season is falling apart. I catch the BBC News, which headlines that United are hammered by Barcelona and shows me the missed penalty and a pretty good shot from Thierry Henry which moves all over the place and Van der Sar just manages to knock down.

I go to bed a worried and disappointed man pondering on that glorious 3-3 when Andy Cole and Dwight Yorke played like Puskas and Di Stefano, and on the contrast between this year’s dross and last year’s first leg; the beautiful game at its peak.
Now I’m home and I have calmed down and watched the whole thing and I really don’t see what all the negativity was about. Sure, I had a fantasy on Tuesday night that we were going to go there and sweep a nervous Barca aside with breathtaking football, three up at half time. Ronny with a sombrero on dubbed “El Arctic Monkey” in the Daily Mail.

Sure, we might have achieved that if Ronny had shot straight. Sure, an away goal would have been nice (to put it mildly). Sure we might go out if Barca can score at Old Trafford. But what’s wrong with everybody? Ronny let Barcelona off the hook, they played slow motion Arsenal football all over the field, they had a constant 65% possession, they made, what, two and a half chances, and that last bit was all down to us.

We could not have had a better start. The first time we got the ball Ronaldo got a free kick and it was deflected wide. Ronny met the right wing corner with a diving header which Milito, a few yards from him, handled, arms way above his head. Ronny struck all the right poses but shaved the outside of the post with the penalty, which then rebounded off the stanchion behind the goal. He stood with his head in his hands as, I suspect, did all United fans who weren’t running to and from the pub in Shedfield at the time.

The rest of the first half was a typical European cat and mouse affair with Hernandez, Deco and Messi spraying the ball about between them and enjoying the freedom of the park up to the edge of our area.

There, Rio and Wes Brown in the centre, Evra and Hargreaves wide, and Scholes and Carrick and even Rooney and Tevez helping out, defended cleanly and intelligently and although there were a few nifty passes into the area, such was the alertness of our defence that I don’t think there was a single serious moment in front of our goal.

For our part, we made little because we had so little of the ball, and when we did get it our forward passing was generally not good enough. Tevez had a weakish header straight at the goalie, we got a couple of corners and when Ronny picked up a suicidal cross field defensive pass he was lustily Nat Lofthoused by Rafael Marquez, and should have had another penalty. Unfortunately, unlike London buses they don’t come in twos.

Admire it or not, you could see Fergie’s strategy. Keep our discipline, contain them, and expose them to the counter when they began to press. In the second half the Catalans stepped up their attacking pace a little and got behind us once or twice, but the United defensive display was pretty impressive and when the ball was put into the danger area it was removed efficiently each time.

It was the counter-attacks that never really materialised, although Ronny was again fouled in the area with no reward, Hargreaves put in a couple of crosses from the right and Carrick produced a lovely little play on the left only to shoot high into the side netting when an astute cross, of the kind he produced at Middlesbrough, would have caused real danger with three United players up on the six yard line.

At the other end Eto’o should have had a penalty when Wes was careless and Rio had to come steaming over to cover. Eto’o stayed on his feet with a brilliant piece of skill. How can the authorities complain about players who dive when you don’t get a penalty if you stay on your feet? With about fifteen minutes to go Thierry Henry came on and he had two shots (which was better than anybody but Ronny), the one the BBC showed and a free kick which Van der Sar had to catch diving to his right.

All in all, then, it was a bit of a non-event. 0-0 is a dodgy score to bring back to old Trafford and we have failed this test before (Rotor Volgograd, Real Madrid, Valencia, Monaco……). Would I rather we had gone there, attacked with style and come back with a defeat? Sorry, but we have failed too often at this stage, and it hurts. I’ll await next week’s outcome before criticising Fergie’s tactics.

Everybody raved about Ferdinand’s contribution and he was class but he could well have given away a penalty with a rash challenge and produced one dreadful pass. Wes Brown concentrated and did well; a couple of slips but at this level that might be expected. Van der Sar was cool. Evra got low marks in The Times but I thought he was superb. James Ducker (who allotted the marks) wants to try playing against an on-form Messi.

Tevez got a slating on the radio (I think Alan Green is trying to undermine him in the public eye; he was the same on Saturday) and some more on the MUFC Yahoo list but I thought this unfair; he worked very hard, was in the thick of the action, was no more at fault in his distribution than anyone else and didn’t get a decent pass from Ronny or Rooney all night. He and Ronaldo and Rooney ran miles with little hope of reward but Ronaldo looked the threat.

Park looked lost at times and his distribution was as poor as anyone’s but he plugged away. I think he is not yet ready at this level after that protracted lay-off; this, after all, is about as tough as it gets. All Barcelona’s midfield artistry and the silky skills of Deco (is his first name Art?) and Messi got them the square root of fuck all and I thought Paul Scholes was man of the match. He seemed always there when threats emerged or the hole was to be filled and he did as much as anyone in the latter stages to try to move the action further forward. He even managed not to get booked.

Now we move from the Nou Camp to Stamford Bridge and on to Old Trafford. The work of an entire season and the hopes and fears of all of us seem to hang on the events of the next few days. Or do they? This is, after all, the semi-final and while we can lose everything, all we can win on Tuesday is another night of opportunity.

Barcelona 0-0 ManUtd: Villains and Heroes

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Barcelona 0-0 ManUtd: Villains and Heroes

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