Ishmael

http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/9262/25141380041441626608746.jpg Interesting image, but what is the significance?

It's not really a requirement for me in order to acknowledge that they are susceptible to the counter attack.

Football was invented by SKY in the 90s. Sorry.

love this photo. it's on the cover of a football photography book i won at a raffle about 15 years ago. wonder where that got to...

remember song having an absolute nightmare at the nou camp last season. just letting messi wonder around the arsenal half with the ball - sure he strolled past him for one of the goals? imo, arsenal need to target barcelona's right side to counter - if they opt to sit back and soak up pressure. walcott needs to play from the left hand side to get behind alves.

i expect arsenal to have a mental collapse at some point and gift the tie to barca

yep. i'm irritated with myself.

but they should have the flexibility in their approach to counter such issues. less so the motivational issues, more so the tendency for teams to put two lines of players out and camp in their own half. as a result imo, they definitely need to stop overplaying their possession when in the final third and they definitely need to address the weaknesses they have at the back / dealing with counter attacks. points like this which incline me to describe guardiola as being tactically limited as you would expect/want him to deal with such issues. yet, we've been here before.

Is this supposed to be amusing?

Calling Madrid's squad "inferior" comes a close second to calling Barcelona's football "tactically s***". You are on fire tonight Dresden. erm, real madrid's team is clearly an inferior footballing team to barcelona. you cannot surely be disputing that? thing about the 'tactically s***' thing is that yeah, i did not express myself sufficiently in that post. so fair play. I despair, I really do. Seriously, Real Madrid's team is not clearly inferior to any team in the world as it is undisputedly one of the best teams in the world run by one of the best managers in the world. They were humiliated by Barcelona nevertheless, and this was as much to do with brilliant tactics as it was to do with individual class, which Real Madrid also have in abundance. Your apparent hatred for Barcelona is clearly blurring your clear vision on the subject.. inferior to barcelona ffs. please understand the context of my statement. they are also an inferior side to the one mourinho had the season prior in milan. love how me saying that real are inferior to barca somehow supports this 'hatred' for barcelona. You're hatred was confirmed when you said the team had a 'spine of c**ts' not the comparison to Real. except that i should be allowed to hate a teams personnel, yet at the same time admire their technical ability.

taken simply, it seems laughable. i clearly have failed to express my understanding. limitation on my part, which is irritating. genuinely do find guardiola's/barcelona's approach/philosophy self-limiting and do feel that guardiola should be doing more with the players at his disposal. their abundance of ability does drag them through many games, which they should imo win with ease. perhaps that sentence is less 'gibberish' that my previous attempts to clarify my stance.

Calling Madrid's squad "inferior" comes a close second to calling Barcelona's football "tactically s***". You are on fire tonight Dresden. erm, real madrid's team is clearly an inferior footballing team to barcelona. you cannot surely be disputing that? thing about the 'tactically s***' thing is that yeah, i did not express myself sufficiently in that post. so fair play. I despair, I really do. Seriously, Real Madrid's team is not clearly inferior to any team in the world as it is undisputedly one of the best teams in the world run by one of the best managers in the world. They were humiliated by Barcelona nevertheless, and this was as much to do with brilliant tactics as it was to do with individual class, which Real Madrid also have in abundance. Your apparent hatred for Barcelona is clearly blurring your clear vision on the subject.. inferior to barcelona. please understand the context of my statement. they are also an inferior side to the one mourinho had the season prior in milan. love how me saying that real are inferior to barca somehow supports this 'hatred' for barcelona.

Urgh, and to think: I actually backed up your corner when you were 'comedy banned'.

Calling Madrid's squad "inferior" comes a close second to calling Barcelona's football "tactically s***". You are on fire tonight Dresden. erm, real madrid's team is clearly an inferior footballing team to barcelona. you cannot surely be disputing that? thing about the 'tactically shit' thing is that yeah, i did not express myself sufficiently in that post. so fair play.

no, for me, it was the inferior team at mourinho's disposal rather than barcelona's approach that resulted in the inhalation. however, your posts has planted a little uncertainty in my head. i'd always assumed that they were nullified somewhat in the inter ties. only a little uncertainty mind

mourinho got his tactics wrong with that real side imo in hindsight, i think they should have gone more toe to toe with barcelona as they didn't have the personnel capable of executing mourinho's approach. really looking forward to the next clash now.

If I was somehow placed in charge as of this second, then no. I wouldn't sack him based on the last fortnight. Reckon we come back to this hypothetical question at the end of the season. Whatever happens, it'll be an exciting season, both in spain and europe (more so europe).

their variations are subtle in their approach, and seem limited to their shape. to my eye at least. i reject how you have compared an inter team to a real team. the only similarity is mourinho. but, the fact that they are two entirely different squads voids any comparison you may choose to make. tbh, real were awful, it wasn't a contest at any stage.

Well, if Guardiola was tactically competent he would understand that there cannot be one way to win a football match. a tactical nirvana does not exist. he needs to stop ignorantly plodding along with the same approach. i.e. this barcelona squad was wasted last season. they should have beaten inter and should have lifted the CL (it's one of the greatest collections of technical and physical ability ever) but they didn't. why? because inter player the better football. better football, i define as being an approach that has a greater certainty of winning.

Assume it because it backs up your point. Very gracious of you. Is it accurate?

My argument about Barcelona's only having one approach, which hinders their effectiveness, is from a purely footballing perspective. a competitive footballing perspective, a game in which winning is everything. You can imply a dislike from that post, yes. I f***ing detest some of the antics many of their players get up to. Don't let that distract you from the point at hand.

Alves does have a shit delivery. Of which I define as being a cross from distance (near to the touch-line). Usually, either over-hit or slow and looping. Will assume that most of his assists are short ranged passes / square balls into the box.

No you are implying a dislike. Such a typical ignorant perspective. As if I have to dislike something to criticize it.

you haven't understood. their range/variety of approaches/tactics/formations is one-dimensional. as in, they can only play one way with one formation. it's not perfect. They only play football the way they believe it should be played, and rightly so. What absolute horse s***. Reckon the whole reason to play competitive football is to win. Yeah and they are winning playing this way. How clueless are you like.. Have won 1 in 3. Sorry. Yes, I get the point that in the whole season context their approach has been successful. However, my argument is that limiting a team to one approach is not wise. Reckon with the players at Barcelona they shouldn't lose a single game, let alone scrape a 2-1 win against a team considerably inferior to them in Bilbao. You clearly do not understand how football works. What am I missing?

Dunno, I'm pretty clear on this. Maybe you should just have another glance back? Main Entry: gibberish Part of Speech: noun Definition: nonsense talk What a s*** post - totally ignorant. I'm defining for you what gibberish means, as I was saying you speak nonsense, which you are doing. That post was vital as your post clearly showed you did not understand the meaning and context of the word gibberish in the aforementioned sentence. Should have been obvious given that I asked you to read back just to make sure that you had comprehended my argument. Typical ignorant internet comedian.