Was massive. People are rightly saying that there's no shame in losing to Barcelona who are the greatest team on the planet by quite some way. But it is not a shame that the difference in quality was completely apparent last night? A champions league final should never be easy, but Barcelona hardly broke a sweat, despite United constantly keeping on top of them they outplayed United with relative ease. As Englands representatives in Europes biggest match last night, does this not mean that the premier league was made to look like sunday league football? United, the best club in the premier league were made to look amateur quite frankly. I think that United should not just accept that they were beaten by the better team, but then build upon the aspiration of being the best team. A busy summer in transfer terms in order to match the Catalans. Well deserved Barcelona, but hopefully you won't be too comfortable for long.
Stats might not have been good in both Arsenal games and overall, we were beaten at the end of the tie. But we still proved that Barca are beatable by winning 2-1 at Emirates
Arsenal beat Barcelona when Barcelona knew they had done enough to win the tie overall. If Arsenal played last night, where Barca had to win the game on the night, however Arsenal would've played wouldn't have mattered. You'd have been trounced aswell.
Don't talk rubbish. We beat them in the first leg mate, when Barca had no idea how the tie would pan out.
They got the crucial away goal and knew they'd ease it at Camp Nou. As I said, make no mistake.. Arsenal would have been trounced last night whatever the tactics in use.
Any team facing Barca would have been trounced, lets remember they have embarrassed Real with the likes of Benzema, Ronaldo, Ozil, Kaka, Alonso, Higuain, Di Maria etc. Valencia was terrble yesterday and in truth should of never started. Hernandez should not have started and instead we should have played a 451 formation with Anderson, Carrick and Fletcher starting and Nani and Park on the wings. Even so we still would have lost. Only Arsenal fans think they could win the final because they live in a delusional cloud created by Wengar. Arsenal fans even thought they could win the league . Barca are simply too good and Real have shown that no matter how much you spend you can't defeat them.
Statistically we are the 2nd best team in the world but most would agree Real are ahead of us now and I would say we are 3rd with Chelsea 4th. However, we really need to improve our squad and I am not talking about 30-40m spend in the summer, I am talking about 80-100m needing to be spent.
Fair play to Arsenal, you did beat them at the Emirates. But the Barcelona performance yesterday was a big step up from the performance at the Emirates, and don't forget Messi's wrongly disallowed goal. Had Barca gone 2-0 up in your backyard, as they rightfully should, that would probably have been game over for Arsenal, and you could argue that bad decision had just as much of an impact on the tie as RVP's sending off. As for Fabregas' error to let Barca score, that was no worse than Valdes' error to let Arsenal score, Messi's errors to throw away three clear cut chances in the first leg, and Busquets putting through his own net when under no real pressure. Had Barca, and Messi in particular, played as well at the Emirates as they played yesterday, you would not have won the game imo.
Barca are one of the greatest sides ever and a load of people say that. It's a one of a kind, I think you would of beat Real Madrid if they had got to the final instead, even if they had the manager they have. Also, I hate how people say 'should' and 'if' when talking about referees. They didn't give it, o well move on. Don't try to back up your point by saying something 'should' of happened.
You were very lucky to go in at half time level so I was expecting a drastic change of tactics as it was obvious if you played the same in the second half the result was going to be a hiding,so as good as Barca were,a lot of the blame surely lies with a poor plan A and no plan B from old baconface
Manchester United have today confirmed that they will unveil new 19 times banner, to celebrate how many times they touched the ball last night.
Completely agree, but I'd also add that you need them (or at least Messi and / or Xavi) to be a bit off colour as well when you face them. In the 3-1 Inter game, not only did Inter get some luck but Barca had also had that 14 hour coach journey which properly messed them up. As a result when Inter pressed them they made errors. When we pressed them on Sat, they kept perfect control of the ball and retained possession as well as I have ever seen them do. Like Lineker said, when you play Barca you need them to be off form or you might as well not even turn up. Maybe. But what plan B can you possibly have against a team that is that good, and playing that well? Pressing to win the ball back didn't work, and neither did playing it quickly to the wings (apart from the goal we scored). So what could we have done?
This is a first, I agree with Swarbs on this one, pressing the ball against Barca is pointless as proven in the 1st half. All they do is triangulate passes at speed and players pressing are left chasing shadows. I'm surprised no one looks at the Chelsea model and how near they came to beating this allegedly unbeatable side? Not only did Chelsea keep them quiet in the Nou Camp but outplayed them at Stamford Bridge. Barcelona's weakness is their defence and dislike players like Drogba in their faces, I've never known a centre back who liked defending going backwards. Of course without the cheating Overebo Chelsea's almost perfect tactics are the only way to beat this Barca side.
Sorry Ginge but the "Chelsea model", much like the Arsenal model, Madrid model, Inter model or United model from 2008, rely on Barca having an off day. Messi was as invisible for both legs of your semi against them in 2009 as he was magnificent on Saturday. Credit to Chelsea in 2009, they almost knocked Barca out and had the decisions gone their way they may well have done (although that ignores the Fairy-soft red for Abidal). But you could say the same for Arsenal and Real this season. And ultimately it's not the model, or the tactics, it's whether the real Barca side shows up. Xavi, Iniesta and Messi made over 300 passes between them on Sat, and all three of them had a 90%+ accuracy. Against that sort of superhuman effort there is nothing you can really do, apart from hope you get lucky.
