Barcelona vs Atletico Madrid review: Nothing athletic about them

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Before the match began the media was only talking about the much awaited battle between the top strikers Messi and Falcao. This became especially thrilling after the recent sluggish performances of FCB at the solitary UCL outing against AC Milan and La Liga draws. Also the fact that both these strikers were leading the goal-scoring charts was like fuel to added to fire. It was 1:30 AM in India when the match was scheduled to begin and a victory at Nou Camp became even more imperative after the arch rivals Real Madrid came back from a horrendous first half performance to beat the debutant Rayo Vallecano at home. With FCB lying fourth in the table, all eyes were fixed on this weekend fixture. However, to nobody’s big surprise the Blaugrana demolished this side 5-0 which showed so much of promise on paper.

The first half began in a routine fashion with Barcelona trying to retain the ball and the opponents hardly showed any resilience. Puyol and Pique did started on bench with Busquets and Mascherano taking their spots in the starting eleven. The FCB players even wore shirts supporting and wishing a speedy recovery for the injured Ibrahim Affellay who could be out of action for more than 6 months. The MVP trio of Messi, Villa and Pedro played upfront and started creating chances immediately but it took a brilliant pass from Xavi and a wonderful set of skills from Villa to put FCB ahead on the scoreboard. A few minutes later Messi made his usual run through the defense but failed to beat the goalie but fortunately it turned into an own goal. And then came this uneventful throw-in which Messi somehow converted into a brilliant move and before anyone winked eyelids it was yet another stupendous goal form the little magician. The halftime whistle came with score 3-0.

The second half started in no different way with the men from Barcelona piling on to the misery of their opponents as the visitors could not create even a single decent chance. This game was little different from the normal Barcelona games. Though the passing was sublime as usual, the team certainly missed the services of Iniesta and the number of passes were limited with Xavi, Cesc and Thiago occassionally gunning for long passes. Messi scored two more goals in the second half to get the second hattrick of the season matching Cristiano Ronaldo and his second goal of the match was truely a fan’s delight. After this convincing victory at home, FCB climbs to the second spot on tha La Liga table with Real Betis ahead of them having a perfect record in four games. Pep Guardiola and his men will have a lot of satisfaction from this match but with the injury roster growing longer and more Champions League matches to come, Guardiola has a tough task ahead of him to keep his boys fit and fierce.