"Celtic Can Join Us In CL 16"- Lionel Messi

If that happens I'm wearing my shorts and t-shirt.

 

You are being biased.

You can wrap it up anyway you want, Busquets has been at it time and time again. There's others in your squad that are the same, same goes for Madrid and most teams.

 

Ive found their comments pretty irritating tbh, like xavi saying we play anti-football and dont like to attack .... he came to that conclusion because of the one game we played? They dont seem to understand they literally forced us (and others) to play that way, we attacked when we could with they players we got. Our whole philosophy is built on attacking football.

 

That's fair...I consider myself pretty balanced though

To compare a thug like Pepe to a player who has never harmed a player intentionally in professional football epitomizes bias...And frankly, pretty poor taste as well

Pepe's antics are well documented, as I mentioned before, they are widely available online and was close to being banned from the league after his disgraceful actions against Getafe a few years ago...Not bias, fact

Facts, not hyperbole...Please

Context, señor...The implication was clear, you drew a comparison on thuggery or antics to Leo kicking out at players, as well...Moreover, placing him the same sentence as Pepe?...Is there a dirtier player in world football, atm?...Not in my head, it's on the page

You've given zero evidence so yeah, it remains a myth

Dirty versus complaining to the referee over dirty play, that makes it like for like?

Yeah, this wasn't my intention to have yet another topic degenerate into Barca vs RM...I merely commented on some unfounded claims here to bring a little balance but carry on

 

Barca cheat just as much as RM, that is the point. They surround the refs, dive, feign injury, and * just as bad as RM.
These are points which you can't, or won't see.

If you think Pepe is a thug you should really watch some British football!
Pepe is like a * oxfam worker compared to some of the * you see, particularly in the lower leagues. The thing I hate about Pepe is his moaning, diving and whining, I don't care that he is a physical player.

He is the same as Ian Black (someone you will be lucky enough to not have seen) - a player who likes to kick others but reacts in horror when someone dares do the same to him.

I personally prefer Barca to Real and don't want to turn this thread into a pure argument either, but the facts as I see them are that both those teams are basically as bad as each other when it comes to bad behaviour on the pitch. Neither of them are really shocking, and if you watch games from around the world and in more physical leagues then you will see this.

I think one bad thing about the Barca/Pep philosophy and the current trend of copycatting them is that physicality has all but left the game.
A beautiful goal will always be savoured, but (though it may sound perverse to you) there is also something brilliant and joyous about a great tackle. Even if it's a dirty foul.

I can guarantee most Celtic fans cheered Beram Kayal's 2 footed slide on El Hadji * as much as they did the goals in our 3-0 drubbing of Rangers (R.I.P.) in 2011.
And this does not mean Kayal is a dirty player, or that Celtic fans are all animals, but football was and is still supposed to be a contact sport and sometimes brawn is more entertaining than beauty.

If all Barca players were like Messi, in the way he rides tackles and rarely kicks out or complains, rather than diving or crying - I would have much more respect for them.

 

Pepe would be seen as dirty player in any top league.

 

I think Pepe is an amazing defender; but he is definitely a thug. Similarly I really rate Mourinho as a coach...but can't stand him as a man.

I don't think any side with Carlos Puyol in it can be accused of not appreciating the physical side of the game; but there is a massive difference, which Mourinho teams do not seem to appreciate, between physical (which can be beautiful) and dirty (which can't IMO). It's like the difference between Victor Wanyama and Kyle Lafferty.
One of my least favourite "Mourinho moments" was Barca v Chelsea years ago, where Carvalho (surely acting on orders from Mourinho) deliberately took the GK out for Chelsea to score a header.

Exactly

You don't have to hate Real to appreciate Barca more- I only wish we could have seen this Barca team take on Real's "Galacticos"! :icon_mrgreen:
I love the way Barca play and far from underachieving I think they have been the victim of some really bad luck in some competitions in recent seasons (e.g. Chelsea last year): it's no wonder they want to express frustration. I do think our tactics were spot on in Barcelona; but that doesn't stop me from understanding the Barca team's point!

Edit: just checked and that Carvalho foul was in the 2004/5 season and John Terry scored the header. To be fair to Mourinho, on watching it again it looks like a spontaneous piece of improvised cheating from Carvalho (a dirty player if ever there was one).

 

Don't get me wrong, I extremely dislike Chelsea, but Barca weren't unlucky against them.

Chelsea came with a gameplan and it worked. Sanchez hit the bar and Messi hit the post but they're just shots off target....they didn't cut them open at will.

At the Nou Camp, they just passed it around the middle, out wide to Iniesta, back in the middle, out wide to Dani Alves, back in the middle....

They weren't the rightful winners because of that.....Chelsea were the rightful winners because they scored more than Barca, end of discussion....the only time they cheated was Terry when he got sent off.

Chelsea were the unlucky ones a few years earlier in that semi-final....at least 2 penalties should have been given....hahaha

 

Well, it may or may not prove to be the end of the discussion, but I certainly think we differ on that one: I think if you hit the woodwork 4 times over two legs then personally I would consider you unlucky. Really, really unlucky. If any one of those had gone in then Chelsea would have had to unpark that particular bus and would have been picked off.

I do take your point about the game a few years ago, though.

 

Mourinho may not be everyones favourite guy but at least he doesn't instruct the opposition on how to play the game. Self righteous people do.

I don't like the current Real Madrid team's antics. But let's get things clear. The Barcelona team contains cheats such as Alves, Busquets, Fabregas and Pedro. Even Puyol always surrounds the referee at any given opportunity. Valdes is like this too and Pinto is a * also. It's just that he's a poor goalkeeper and doesn't get the chance to display this every week.

The patronising, degrading and quite frankly insulting comments from people associated with Barca in the past few weeks have made me lose a bit of affection for a team that I have admired for many years. Not that they will care how I or any other individual feels right enough, but besides the four English teams, Barca are now the team I want to see lose most in the competition.

 

RR - I know what you're saying and it's not like I completely disagree...but if for example a team has 3 chances cleared off the line, then you can call it being unlucky or you can call it good defending.

Now hitting the frame of the goal is very close to scoring, but there's still an element of "poor" finishing behind it....Barca still created enough chances in both ties to have gone through, but at the end of the day they didn't score them.....no matter how close they came, in my eyes that doesn't make them unlucky not to go through.

They played for most of the 2nd leg against 10 men, with Bosingwa as one of Chelsea's CB's.....my problem with Barca is they don't appear to have a plan B.....well since Zlatan left....if their style isn't working, they'll continue to try it.

They should have, imo, put Pique up top and starting whipping a few crosses in....but they have to "play the right way" at the expense of possibly not going through.

 

G I T T




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I made the mistake of watching that second leg and remember screaming at the telly for them to do just that! If nothing else it would have forced Chelsea not to sit their FBs so narrow, which would have opened up more space to pass through the defence...was gutted at the end of that game.

@PM20: every team has cheats these days, we have one too (he's a diver: we all know who he is). Nobody is saying that Barcelona are the cleanest team in the modern game, merely that they are a relatively clean team (unlike any Mourinho team).

 

Drogba won chelsea that game. Sure he spent 87 mins with his * to the floor but what a target man. Sure they could have went out all attack and lost 7-0 but they went for tactics, and won. Simple. Barca should have noticed there passing game was not working, changed it up a bit ie crosses.