Messi (75 page)
Authors: Guillem Balague
Conscious of the fact that his side contained more quality than he had ever had before, Mourinho looked to face Barcelona head-on. But he made various errors. He asked the physically fragile Özil to
cover too much space in defence, including when Leo had the ball. The
merengues
should have kept a very tight central pressing line but ended up being an unresponsive unit with lines set too far apart with plenty of gaps to attack: a joy for Leo. The central defenders had no point of reference because ‘the Flea’ was moving around all of the attacking zone and Khedira and Xabi Alonso were always outnumbered. In the second half Mourinho brought on Lass Diarra as a third central midfielder, a precursor to what he would do in future encounters.
GB: What do you remember about the 5–0, what did you ask Leo to do?
PG: We adapted ourselves to Cristiano’s counter-attacks. Based on where Cristiano was, our full-back had to go forward or come back. That was the defensive question; we knew from experience that, being a Mourinho side, they would attack the spaces. I was clear that they would wait for us to lose the ball to attack us as quickly as possible in behind our defenders, especially through Cristiano, who was always more isolated waiting for the counter. And when in attack, we should look for Leo. We had to find him in positions where he could be in space, and move freely and score. Curiously, he didn’t score, but he did set up a few goals. We played well.
GB: In that season there was another Leo moment that had nothing to do with scoring. I remember him doing an incredibly long run after he had lost the ball in his opponent’s half, to get it back off Kun Agüero. Have you ever used him to say, ‘look, if a player like this does it …’?
PG: Yes, sometimes we have used our forwards who have made an enormous effort in defence to say: that’s how we are as a team, it’s not just the defenders that run, that’s how we are as a team, don’t ever forget it. That particular incident has become famous. Leo constantly needs challenges and at that particular time there were debates as to whether Kun was better than Leo. It was then a personal duel: now I’m going to run and take the ball off you. It’s probably all about personal challenges, when he has them there are no problems.
It’s worth taking a look at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YxOSDgrPzIJzBvB5TcdQ
GB: From 17 April to 3 May those four famous and controversial
clásicos
were played. Firstly in the league, the Copa del Rey final, and then the Champions League semi-final. How was Leo during those days with tension at an all-time high?
PG: Well, the pressure he carries inside. Sometimes we forget he carries the weight of being the best player in the world, of all time, that he has a whole country behind him and a club that hopes he can win them games. And this on a daily basis. I always think that he is the best in history for that reason, for the continuity of things that he has done. I am convinced that Cruyff changed football, Pelé, of course, Maradona, but they were from another era. It’s true that there are more cameras and for that reason less aggression than before. Before, so they say, there was a lot more kicking and the game was much harder than it is now. But it is also true that today everybody is physically much better prepared. Bear in mind that this bloke has the ability in this day and age to score 50, 60 goals and appear in every game, every day. It’s very difficult for a youngster to be able to do this over such a long period of time. More than just the titles he has won, no one will change my opinion of him whether he wins a World Cup or not. If he does, congratulations to him, but if he doesn’t my opinion won’t change. He is a unique player and his challenge now is the World Cup, we’ll see. In those days of the
clásicos
he probably felt the pressure but I thought he looked okay, as always. I was probably more occupied looking to find a way of winning rather than concerning myself with how the others were. I spent days thinking and studying what both we and our rivals had done and what we had to do to win, who we had available …the day of the semi-final of the Champions League, Iniesta injured himself and we had to put in Keita …you are always occupied with matters like this.
GB: At any time has he come up to you and said: Calm down, we’re going to win. That’s what he said to the Under 20 World Cup coach Pancho Ferraro and to some of the trainers at La Masía.
PG: No. He never said it to me, certainly not to me directly. But there have been moments or certain gestures that have made me think: this bloke’s going to win it for us today. You catch a look, you look at him and then you say to yourself: he’s going to win it. He has to be convinced that we’re going well to feel like this.
The first
clásico
in those two weeks was in the league, at the Bernabéu. Madrid were eight points adrift of Barcelona with seven games to go, but José Mourinho used it as a way of initiating hostilities with his sights set on winning the cup, but above all the Champions League. The grass was left long and dry to impede good passing of the ball, and Madrid played with a defensive midfield trio, one of which was the centre-back Pepe. The objective was to kill the spaces in which Leo operated. Both sides shared control of the game and both were content with a 1–1 draw; the league title was now destined for the Barcelona trophy cabinet for the third year running.
But it had been a tense affair: seven yellow cards, a red for Albiol and two penalties. The Madrid fans insulted Leo every time he touched the ball, and from the stands a laser pen was directed at his eyes while he took the penalty from which he scored. Mourinho’s efforts to emotionally destabilise Barcelona were beginning to work. With the match just about finished Leo went chasing after a ball that he just failed to reach. He then decided to whack it into the stands, narrowly missing former Madrid coach John Toshack and a Sky Sports correspondent, who were sitting at pitch level.
The game carried on in the press conference afterwards and in the coaching sessions: Mourinho wanted to keep the tension cranked up, reminding his Spanish players that they shouldn’t regard their colleagues in the national side as friends, players he accused of being ‘actors’ who constantly tried to influence the referee. What’s more, he asked the directors at Madrid to try to stop the watering of the Mestalla pitch where the final of the Copa del Rey was to be played. But they failed to carry out his request.
The defeat hit the squad hard. Leo felt he had not done enough: he had been unable to find a solution to the tactical plan set up by Madrid. It was a double disappointment.
20 April 2011. Copa del Rey final. Barcelona 0
–
1 Real Madrid. Mestalla Stadium
FC Barcelona: Pinto; Alvés, Piqué, Mascherano, Adriano (Maxwell, 118th minute): Busquets (Keita, 107th minute), Xavi, Iniesta; Pedro, Messi and Villa (Afellay, 105th minute). Subs not used: Pinto; Adriano, Maxwell, Thiago and Mascherano.
Real Madrid: Casillas; Arbeloa, Ramos, Carvalho (Garay, 118th minute), Marcelo; Pepe, Xabi Alonso, Khedira (Granero, 103rd minute); Di María, Ronaldo and Özil (Adebayor, 69th minute). Subs not used: Dudek; Albiol, Granero, León and Higuaín.
Goals: 0
–
1, 103rd minute: cross from Di María finished by Cristiano Ronaldo header beyond the reach of Pinto.
Cayetano Ros,
El País
: [Messi] desperate, tried from just about every position possible dropping deep and wide, without success. His zigzagging invariably ended in the snares of the Madrid defence. ‘The Flea’ controlled less, because his team was passing the ball less than ever in the first half. After the interval everything changed and his deep pass to Pedrito was excellent despite the fact that the linesman disallowed the goal for offside. Messi drifted towards the right-hand side, leaving the centre of the park less crowded and gaps started appearing which the
azulgrana
penetrated. And with Villa as a centre-forward the team found a point of reference they had not had until then.
Off the pitch, Mourinho was interpreting Barcelona’s game and the danger of Messi well. In bringing in a third midfielder, Messi had found himself coming across another obstacle in his path. Pepe could take charge of stopping the inside diagonal runs that the Argentinian would frequently make, and that was going to be the big gamble that Mourinho would take when the two sides met in the Champions League semi-finals.
The tension continued. Pep Guardiola saw his side so downcast
that he decided to take the bull by the horns. His motivational team talk was going to take place in Madrid in a deliberate move, at a press conference before the match. The Barcelona coach said that Mourinho was ‘
el puto amo
’ (the ‘fucking guv’nor’) of the press conferences. This title, he said, he would give him, the other one they would contest on the pitch. For the first leg, Mourinho called for more pressure on their opponents, on the referee, more committed tackling and counter-attacks but without risk: winner takes all at the return leg at the Camp Nou. But the plan went wrong because Pepe put in a tackle with his studs showing on Dani Alvés who made the most of the challenge: the result was a red card for the defensive pivot. Mourinho was also sent off. It was a moment of highly charged emotional intensity, just half an hour from the end of the game. A match that, at that point, needed someone to grab it by the scruff of the neck.
27 April 2011. Champions League semifinal first leg. Real Madrid 0
–
2 Barcelona
Barcelona: Valdés; Alvés; Piqué, Mascherano, Puyol; Xavi, Busquets, Keita; Pedro (Afellay, 71st minute), Messi and Villa (Sergi Roberto, 90th minute). Subs not used: Pinto, Jeffrén, Milito, Fontàs and Thiago Alcántara.
Real Madrid: Casillas; Arbeloa, Ramos, Albiol, Marcelo; Xabi Alonso, Pepe, Lass; Ozil (Adebayor, 46th minute), Di María and Ronaldo. Subs not used: Adán, Kaká, Benzema, Granero, Garay and Higuaín.
Goals: 0
–
1. 76th minute: Leo Messi finishes after a pass from the right from Ibrahim Afellay. 0
–
2. 87th minute: Leo Messi, individual effort.
José Sámano,
El Pais
: In another
clásico
of intrigue and excuses for some, the football was about Barcelona and the glory of their greatest ambassador: Messi. Nothing symbolises Barcelona more than ‘the Flea’. In front of them, a shutdown by a Madrid side that enjoyed a meagre 26.4 per cent possession. Statistics far more conclusive than a sendingoff,
however harsh that might have been. Messi, Barcelona, the visitors avoided the miserable 0–0 that Mourinho was dreaming of … Messi demonstrates more as an illustrious midfielder and the goal may not be as close to him as it was before, but he still appears at the right time. Ubiquitous and omnipresent, ‘the Flea’ assists and scores.
Jordi Quixano,
El País
: Messi. Two versions, one result. At the start, he was too far from the final metres, from Casillas’s goal, he spent too much time on dribbles in unthreatening zones. As soon as Barcelona found themselves playing against ten men, the screw tightened on their opponents and he set the seal on the game. First he successfully met a cross from Afellay and later he scored after a superb mazy dribble. Two plays, two goals.
The most international
clásico
of them all, the one that was talked about most, had finished with a demonstration of quality and emotional stability from Leo in Cristiano Ronaldo’s backyard. But also with a torrent of accusations. Tensions boiled over in the tunnel leading to the dressing rooms with both verbal and physical confrontations and with Puyol and Pepe swapping blows. Messi decided to distance himself from the scene. Mourinho was asked why this always happened to him against Barcelona after announcing: ‘If I tell the referee and UEFA what I’m thinking, my career finishes today.’ Madrid denounced Barcelona for what they said was unsporting behaviour by Guardiola and eight other players (Leo wasn’t among them) to UEFA’s Discipline and Control Committee, an accusation that was dismissed.
Mourinho watched the return leg at the team hotel in Barcelona. Madrid, for the first time under the Portuguese coach, looked to press higher up the pitch, his players’ favoured option.
‘We want him to have freedom so he can give full rein to his creative talents,’ said Guardiola at the end of the game. ‘He is pleased with that, it can be done because he has players who support him, as Pedro and Villa have done. Because if one doesn’t have the will, the desire and the ability to know that what you are doing is for the benefit of the whole group, it is impossible to get to a final as magical as the one we will be competing for on the 28th.’
3 May 2011. Champions League semi-final second leg. Barcelona 1
–
1 Real Madrid
Barcelona: Valdés; Alvés, Piqué, Mascherano, Puyol (Abidal, 90th minute); Busquets, Xavi, Iniesta; Pedro, Messi and Villa (Keita, 74th minute). Subs not used: Olazábal, Jeffrén, Fontàs and Thiago Alcántara.
Real Madrid: Casillas; Arbeloa, Carvalho, Albiol, Marcelo; Lass Diarra, Xabi Alonso; Di María, Kaká (Özil, 60th minute), Ronaldo; Higuaín (Adebayor, 55th minute). Subs not used: Dudek, Benzema, Granero, Garay and Nacho Fernández.
Goals: 1
–
0, 54th minute: Pedro. 1
–
1, 64th minute: Marcelo.
Luis Martín,
El País
: Always Messi, with or without a goal. ‘The Flea’, who runs in excess of eight kilometres, demonstrated his generosity working like a navvy rather than a star because that is what the game demanded of him. Messi did not score, but his talents are difficult to resist. Yesterday the Argentine from Rosario had an enormous game, but that is hardly news any more. He celebrated the goal as if he had scored it himself. Generous, ‘the Flea’ jumped for joy in his orange boots for the glory of everyone.
It is hardly a surprise that Messi has been fouled more than anyone else in the Champions League: there are days when the only way he can be stopped is by bending the rules. Often he is left physically drained after 12 or more fouls.
Ever shy, came the moment to celebrate, Messi let himself be carried out by the festive atmosphere inside the Camp Nou, embracing Pedro and Busquets. He was in his glory. Overflowing with emotion. So much so that when it looked like he could not fight back the tears, tears of joy of course, Pep Guardiola, his protector, appeared in order give him a hug.