Looking back: Year 2011 for Barcelona in numbers

The year 2011 has come to an end and for FC Barcelona, this has been another hugely successful year. They managed to win hearts and trophies with their brilliant display of football. Starting the year with a close 2-1 win over Levante on 4^th January to a huge 9-0 win over Hospitalet in the Copa Del Rey on 22^nd December, Barcelona have continued their brilliant run of football. Here is a look on some of the important numbers for Barcelona fans this year.

ZERO. Yes, this is the number of time Barcelona have been beaten at the Camp Nou this year. Throughout 2011, Barcelona have played 30 matches on the home turf winning 26 of them and were held to a draw on 4 occasions.

Nou Camp: The fort!

TWO. The summer transfer season saw FC Barcelona bring in two new signings to the main squad, Alexis Sanchez and Cesc Fabregas. While in the previous few years, the transfer season used to be a nightmarish time for Barcelona fans with the club buying players with huge amount of money just for them to fail in the long run, this year Barcelona have surprised everyone by bringing in two highly talented players in the team in no bank-breaking amount of money. And to add to the joy, both young Chilean Alexis and homecoming Cesc Fabregas have been hugely successful in the last few months with the team.

THREE. Three players were sold in the transfer market to different clubs, Bojan to AS Roma, Jeffren to Sporting Lisbon and Oriol Romeu to Chelsea. And the new President Sandro Rossel has done a brilliant job here too, getting good amount of money from the deals and also forcing some buyback clauses in all the three transfers to prevent future Cesc-gate. Finally, Barcelona have come strong in the transfer market to shed their history of flop transfers.

FOUR. Of the 64 official matches played throughout the year at home, away or at neutral venues, Barcelona have failed to score in just four of them. That includes a 0-1 loss in the Copa Del Rey final against arch rivals Real Madrid, 0-0 draws against Deportivo la Coruna and Sevilla and another 0-1 loss to Getafe in La Liga.

FIVE. Barcelona won 5 of the 6 trophies in which they participated this year. Winning Spanish League Primera Division, UEFA Champions League, Spanish Super Cup, UEFA Super Cup and FIFA Club World Cup. They just missed Copa Del Rey losing 0-1 to Real Madrid in the one-off final in May 2011.

Celebrating is a common thing for Barca!

FIVE. Only on 5 occasions that anyone was able to hold the Blaugrana juggernaut. The most painful being the defeat to Real Madrid in the Copa Del Rey which not only put a blot on the perfect record of Pep Guardiola’s Barcelona against Real Madrid but also did cost culés a trophy. But for the Barca fans who are so used to winning every match, losses to Real Betis (1-3) in Copa Del Rey Quarter Final, Arsenal (1-2) in UEFA Champions League Round of 16, Real Sociedad (1-2) and Getafe (0-1) in Liga are equally bad.

SEVEN. In a rare set of events, Barcelona faced the arc rivals Real Madrid 7 times this year including 4 quick matches in 18 days. The biggest two teams in the world met each other twice in domestic league, twice in Champions League, once in Copa Del Rey final and again twice in Spanish Super Cup. In these 7 matches, Barcelona won 3, drew 3 and lost just 1 match.

SIXTEEN. Barcelona were blamed for having a small squad in the previous two years and Guardiola mostly fielded a predictable eleven in all their matches. But this time the situations changed. With the new players Alexis Sanchez and Cesc Fabregas and an emergence of Isaac Cuenca as the next big star helped Guardiola experiment a lot with the team. In the 16 matches Barcelona played this season, Pep fielded a different starting eleven in every single match. Call it experiment or display of their arsenal, this change was good for the fitness of the team.

TWENTY TWO. In the year 2011, 22 different players scored for FC Barcelona. Top scorers being Messi (55), Villa (19), Pedro (16 ), Xavi (11), Fabregas (11) and Iniesta (8).

Just one among 22!

ONE HUNDRED SEVENTY. This is the number of goals Barcelona scored in all the official matches played in the calendar year. And in these 64 matches, they have conceded only 39 goals. That shows how much they dominated their oppositions.

The way Barcelona rolled over each and every opponent they faced in 2011, it is almost impossible to put all the interesting statistics in an article. I tried to put in the most important ones to celebrate the year that passed by leaving a lot of memories. Hopefully, there will be a lot more to write about this brilliant team in the upcoming year.

Happy New Year to all the readers.