Big teams have lazy nights. After ten minutes of the match, it was already noticeable: the team had come out asleep on the field and stood out for the snoring of the defensive line, which recovered Araújo – we have had better nights – and lined up for the first time Íñigo Martínez – the departure of the ball is not his forte – a supposedly solvent tandem.
Ter Stegen joined the pajama party, off-center, and Mallorca was a party with the second goal, the work of Abdón Prats, the devil of Artà, the best mustache in Spanish football since Vicente del Bosque was playing in Castellón. The 2-1 score at half-time confirmed Barça’s lousy defensive start, 8 goals in seven league games. A disaster (in the past season, with 15 games there were six goals).
Why does a computer come out asleep and running on some days and on others, on the other hand, it comes out plugged in? Is it a matter of the coach and his coaching staff or of the footballers, who think they are formidable?
Fortunately for Barça, Xavi canceled his rehearsals, the rotations and removed the victims from the field – Ferran Torres, the most injured – to achieve another comeback, that Madrid style of winning that Barça is subscribing to, the ‘fan who doesn’t know whether to cheer or start worrying about such a suicidal strategy. If a foreigner were to ask what differentiates the fans of Real Madrid from those of FC Barcelona, ??one would tell him that they explode when they win in the last minute and those of FC Barcelona regret having done things wrong before. With all its rebelliousness, going back to Barça is uncomfortable and less pleasant than in Madrid. A matter of aesthetics and principles…
Raphinha’s crosses were crying out for a Lewandowski – guarantee of goal – and the wings, agitation, which Lamine Yamal contributed so well, to whom Xavi is wisely dosing. It looks more like a repulsor and is spared the responsibility in unfriendly, blocked and not exciting matches.
Being a match played in the middle of the day, with 45 minutes on the clock, FC Barcelona came out of Son Moix unscathed, one of those fields where the leagues are won on the condition that they come out centred. The moral lesson is that in order to recover, it is not enough to want to recover: you must not give half the game away and leave the epic to others.
Against a willing Mallorca, they did not earn a point. They lost two of them and the club got the impression – faked, perhaps – that this season, unlike last season, the defense is struggling, which forces offensive excellence and more possession of the ball. Saturday’s epic against Celta was left last night in the frustrating will and can’t of the second half, no other notice that in the matches he comes out focused and with clear ideas, without relying on the punch in attack, that this team doesn’t have too much either. Between traffic jams and rushes, red alert: goals fall easily. And they have no way back in the Champions League.
