Spanish La Liga Thread

@Enzo
I've nothing against Messi, I just agree with Aboutreika18: IMO (key word: pardon me if I didn't wrote it in my previous post) Ballon d'Or should go to someone who had an important role in various important tournaments this season. That's why I wrote Casillas and Pirlo are my wishes (ignoring Drogba, who stopped play competitive football after CL final and didn't have an amazing EPL season, unlike Pirlo).
However, you are right about Messi, he fits FIFA Ballon d'Or's definition of Ballon d'Or winner: "world’s best player", so according to FIFA he can win it even (more than) 9 times in a row.
 
If they give it to someone other than Messi, then Sneijder was screwed 2 years ago.
 
I think it's just unfortunate for players to get any accolades under the Messi era. I wonder , how important was Messi's upbringing to be so good. He played for Barça so long. Looking at CR he still plays like he did at MUTD. Where is his next lvl (passing game)He should of stayed, would of gotten his personal FIFA awards by now. I would love for Messi to say "I'm confident if I was to leave I wouldn't be the top player I am today" plz :LOL:
 
I would say Falcao has been the best player in Spain for the calendar year 2012. He is a sensational finisher, and the difference between Atletico being a top 3 team and just a top half of the table team. He's the ultimate predator, he only needs the slighest sniff of a chance (such as a pass into him or a defender dwelling on the ball) to score. When it game to the big games in the Super Cup, in the Europa league, he didnt dissapoint, he got 36 goals in his first season at Atletico. And this is playing for a team that isn't part of the big two. When Atletico play Spanish teams they always face a relativly tough match - teams don't go to the Calderon to have their tummys tickled like they do at the Nou Kamp and the Bernabeu. He's only got better and better since he's settled in at Atletico these last few months especially. He's also been sensational for Colombia, scoring key goals in their last four games against Paraguay, Chile, Boliva and Uruguay with his stoppage time winner, at altitude, in La Paz being particularly impressive. Of course he'll never win the Golden Ball as he doesn't have the supporting cast that Messi and Ronaldo have and he certainly doesnt have the publicity engines that surround those players (like adidas, nike, pepsi etc). But if you look at it just from the impact of his football I'd easily give it to him.
 
I agree that Falcao is up there, but imo if Cavani was at Atletico and Falcao at Napoli, Cavani would be the name everyone is talking about.

I see them as very similar players that easily hit 20+ a year.
 
The huge hype surrounding him right now is just due to the media that don't know any shit other than the big/winner leagues/teams of Europe and their stars. Falcao wasn't any different at Porto than what he is now with Atletico, if not playing better then. I always loved Cavani but I think he is much overhyped among Serie A fans than he deserves. I don't find their styles similar to each other either. Cavani is a much better shooter over distance and can be effective out wide as well, whilst Falcao is the undisputed king of goal poaching and aerial battles in the penalty area. Like the difference between Batistuta and Zamorano, I guess. Some favor Cavani, some favor Falcao for their liking. I don't want to be any disrespectful towards you Milanista, but your post, the 'if x was at a and y was at b' part, doesn't make any sense to me.

And, remember mate, how Falcao's Colombia crushed Cavani's Uruguay not so long time ago. :P
 
The Ballon D'or should go to the best player in the world, so Messi should win it...no matter how much times and no matter how close Ronaldo is too him...Messi is the best player in the world. There is no discussion.

This said, individual awards in teams sports are nonsense.
 
Kanouté said:
The huge hype surrounding him right now is just due to the media that don't know any shit other than the big/winner leagues/teams of Europe and their stars. Falcao wasn't any different at Porto than what he is now with Atletico, if not playing better then. I always loved Cavani but I think he is much overhyped among Serie A fans than he deserves. I don't find their styles similar to each other either. Cavani is a much better shooter over distance and can be effective out wide as well, whilst Falcao is the undisputed king of goal poaching and aerial battles in the penalty area. Like the difference between Batistuta and Zamorano, I guess. Some favor Cavani, some favor Falcao for their liking. I don't want to be any disrespectful towards you Milanista, but your post, the 'if x was at a and y was at b' part, doesn't make any sense to me.

And, remember mate, how Falcao's Colombia crushed Cavani's Uruguay not so long time ago. :P
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No offence taken :)

I see your point about Falcao being a poacher, but I honestly think Cavani is one of Europe's top strikers. He proved it in the CL last year and in Serie A in the last 3 years.

Anyway, I like both players :D
 
Cavani isn't over-rated. He's one of the best strikers around and a great player.

Falcao however IS the undisputed KING and deserves ALL the recognition and hype in the world! And I agree with Kanoute that though they have similarities, they also have their differences, so I wouldn't necessarily compare the two. Cavani for example has better crossing on him and can provide a supporting role or even out wide just fine as well where as Falcao is less versatile that way and is a pure #9 who's only there to score goals!

I agree with Edmundo that in terms of 'impact', effectiveness and performance, he's right up there with Messi and Ronaldo and should definitely be one of the prime candidates for Ballon 'dOr.
 
Milanista said:
No offence taken :)

I see your point about Falcao being a poacher, but I honestly think Cavani is one of Europe's top strikers. He proved it in the CL last year and in Serie A in the last 3 years.

Anyway, I like both players :D
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I also rate them both so highly as you do, mate. I'm really not biased towards one of these two guys, even though I'm a huge fan of Falcao (just a matter of taste). Don't you doubt it. :)
 
Yep, seems like that...

Last year it was RM with two digit advantage, now it is Barca...and it is (I hate to say this) deserved
 
Good article about Cristiano Ronaldo (from the Guardian website by Jonathan Wilson).

Real Madrid stand 11 points behind Barcelona in the league only 13 games into the season. They looked distinctly second best in taking just one point from two games in the Champions League against Borussia Dortmund. Pressure is mounting, it seems, on José Mourinho: six previous Real Madrid managers have found themselves more than six points off the lead at this stage of the season; none have made it until May. Yet it may be that the criticism is being directed at the wrong Portuguese.
Cristiano Ronaldo's goal stats are preposterous: 165 in 164 games since he joined Real Madrid in 2009. Physically he is monstrous: he has an explosive pace but also balance and deftness; he is strong enough that many opponents simply bounce off him and he is good in the air. He is exceptionally gifted with both feet. He is an extraordinary footballer, by many measures one of the greatest handful the world has known. He may also be the reason this Real Madrid team never wins the Champions League.
To an extent, of course, such a statement is ludicrous. With a fair enough wind, anybody who reaches the last 16 can win the Champions League – hard though it is to imagine Ronaldo accepting a role as an auxiliary wing-back as Samuel Eto'o did for Internazionale in the 2010 semi-final or driving himself to exhaustion with the sort of selflessness Didier Drogba showed at times last season. The point is more that no side that contains Ronaldo can reach the level that Barcelona did under Pep Guardiola or Milan did under Arrigo Sacchi, or Liverpool did under Bob Paisley, or Ajax did under Rinus Michels and Stefan Kovacs – when they are so good that it's almost a bigger story when they fail to win the European Cup than when they do.
Those sides, who stand as the greatest club teams there have been in the past 40 years, share the fact that they were about the collective rather than the individual. Valeriy Lobanovskyi took the principle so far that he argued that the coalitions between players were more important than the players themselves. For Marcelo Bielsa, whose theories have shaped the modern football environment more than anyone else's, this issue is clear. "We can't have anybody in the squad who thinks they can win games on their own," he said. "The key is to occupy the pitch well, to have a short team with no more than 25m from front to back and to have a defence that is not distracted if somebody moves position." After recent changes in the offside law he may revise that figure upwards but the basic point remains: the team is a system that is at its best when compact.
With Ronaldo, though, it's always all about him. Take, for example, the 2008 Champions League final. Ronaldo, playing on the left side of midfield, headed Manchester United into the lead. For half an hour or so he dominated Michael Essien, who was playing at right-back for Chelsea that night. But then Essien started running past him. Ronaldo didn't track him. One Essien surge led to Frank Lampard's equaliser. Chelsea had the better of the second half and extra-time, in part because Essien's advancement gave them an extra body in midfield.
Much has been made of the fact that Ronaldo ended the evening, having missed his penalty in the shoot-out, sitting and weeping alone on the halfway line while his victorious team-mates celebrated in front of the United fans at one end. Perhaps that does speak of a certain self-centredness, a need always to be the one who claims the glory; far more significant, though, was that it was his indiscipline that had allowed Chelsea back into the game.
That was why Sir Alex Ferguson used him so often as a centre-forward that season: there his abilities could damage opponents without his laxity damaging United. Wayne Rooney, a lesser player than Ronaldo in many ways – and less disciplined in terms of staying in shape off the pitch – could be trusted to track an attacking full-back. The last-16 game with Porto was emblematic: in the first leg Ronaldo played wide, Rooney central and the Porto full-back Aly Cissokho caused untold problems; in the second Rooney and Ronaldo switched and Cissokho was kept in check.
The lesson has not been learned. When Ronaldo comes up against a strong driving right-back, Real struggle. Dani Alves, for all his defensive flaws, has generally had the better of him in Clásicos over the past three seasons. Philip Lahm, in the first leg particularly, was key as Bayern Munich won their Champions League semi-final against Real Madrid last season – his overlap led directly to Mario Gómez's winner. Ronaldo was still good enough to score twice in the second leg; the question is whether the problems he causes the team shape are worth it.
It was a similar story against Dortmund this season. Essien, playing at left-back in the game in Germany, was widely blamed for his inability to handle Marco Reus but Ronaldo's failure to check Lukasz Piszczek's surges for right-back were just as much to blame. You wonder what might have happened at the Euros had the Czech Republic had the courage to attack Ronaldo with Theodor Gebreselassie.
In a world in which systematised football is de rigueur, Ronaldo is an anachronism. Collective pressing was devised in the USSR in the 1960s by Viktor Maslov, who culled from his Dynamo Kyiv team anybody who refused to fulfil their share of defensive work. That included a hugely popular and skilful but dilettantish left winger – Lobanovskyi; Ronaldo, it's fair to say, is unlikely to follow a similar path to the Colonel, beguiling as it is to think of him in 30 years glowering from beneath a leather cap in a dugout having redefined the use of science in football. Only one player, the attacking midfielder Andriy Biba "retained full rights of democracy"; playing centrally he didn't have to attack the opposing full-back. Had Ronaldo moved into the middle, his lack of defensive work might have been possible to accommodate; by insisting on playing wide, it becomes, given the importance of attacking full-backs in the modern game, a liability.
To an extent, this is the Real Madrid way. Since the presidency of Santiago Bernabéu, it has favoured stars over system, something that led Sacchi to walk out after being appointed director of football in 2004-05, complaining about the insistence on "specialists" – that is, players who could function in only one way.
Ronaldo will continue to bully lesser sides and occasionally good ones. In a one on one with a defender he is formidable. He finishes magnificently. He is an awesome player. But at the highest level, against the best opposition, his way of playing becomes a weakness for opponents to exploit. He said recently that he thinks he doesn't get the credit he deserves because of perceptions about his personality; the problem is that, whatever he is really like in private, that perceived character pervades the way he plays. He should be a great strength for Real Madrid – he is a great strength; but he is also a flaw.
 
I don't see the point of the article, it says Ronaldo can be a liability wide when his team is defending which is correct but for most games his team is on the front foot and when you come up against the real big guns playing him as a CF solves the problem.

I'd have Ronaldo as a CF over anyone else on the planet.
 
I think the main liability of Ronaldo is his selfishness and that he continues to make bad choices in big matches. Not that it has any impact on his numbers, because he scores a lot. But it may have a big impact on the numbers of his team.

Let's say he has an average of 9 shots per match. 5 of them are done in awkward situations, or in plays that could have a better goal rate if he continued the play on, crossed or passed.

That's why he always plays well against small teams(and I'm not talking about scoring, I'm talking about PLAYING well and make your teammates play better). Because he will have 8 or 9 chances and end up scoring. And against small teams, scoring usually means winning at Real Madrid.

But against big guns, even if he can score a goal while undeperforming (the same could be said about Falcao, Messi, Neymar, Aguero, etc...), he tends not to play well overall. And why? Because against powerful teams he will have only 3 or 4 chances, and doing wrong decisions then costs a lot. Not involving your teammates too many times has some costs. We've seen this in many matches of Man Utd, Madrid and Portugal. Matches in which he ends up shooting from 40 meters, moaning when he looses the ball and getting fustrated. But his teammates are even more fustrated than him. He doesn't make his teammates better. That's a risk in certain situations.

I'm not saying he must be perfect, nobody is (not even Messi), but other than scoring a goal here and there he doesn't have real impact on big games, he doesn't own the flow of the match, he hardly decides big matches by passing, he hardly creates his own plays. Add to that his poor tracking back in the wing and against big teams you can see why Ronaldo never seems to shine completely, and that's what the article is about.

On the other side, let's take Messi for a brief and easy comparison. Messi didn't score any goal in the 5-0 against Madrid 2 years ago, but he was the key player of the match, doing 3 assists and driving defenders mad. When was the last time Ronaldo had that kind of impact on a big match? And without scoring?

Take the example of free kicks. He has a very poor goal rate on free kicks (he was around 50th in La Liga in this department last season). Ozil, Alonso and Ramos are great free kick shooters with much better goal averages, but they can hardly shoot. How many goals has Madrid lost by allowing Ronaldo to shoot them practically all?

The fact is that Ronaldo limits his impact to goals, and off the ball he hardly contributes to the team in any form.
Note that he continues to be an awesome finisher, and one of the best finishers I've witnessed. But too many times he thinks first of himself instead of the team. He probably lacks the skills to make his teammates better: vision, tactical sense, good off the ball movements.

He's a superstar! The problem is people trying to compare him to Messi. This comparison has no sense at all. Messi is a playmaker, a finisher, a winger and a teamplayer at the same time. Messi can decide a big match by scoring, assisting or simply dragging defenders out of position, or delivering killer passes, or dribbling everybody. The impact of Messi in a match is brutal, no matter if he scores. He has the tools to make himself and the team shine.

Ronaldo only has the tools to make himself shine. That's why on big games this can be a double edge knife.
 
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IMO ROnaldo has the tools to be the best player in the world, that means that he as everything to let his team shine.
The only thing that he lacks is his mentality. He is so obsessed with being the best player (in a team sports) that the team suffers because of it.
The best example still is the first Man Utd-Barcelona final. The press (who always need a story) saw this match as the ultimate match between Messi and Ronaldo and not between two teams. Ronaldo did lem himself carry away with all this nonsense and he was desperately to win the match by himself. Until Eto'o's goal (Barcelona's first) Man Utd was actually the better team but the ywere hardly dangerous because every time they could be threatening Ronaldo tried a long distance shot instead of passing to a better placed team mate.

It's ironical/tragical that the day Ronaldo stops trying to be the best individual player (and then would play for the team) he would have a much better chance at being the best individual player. At the moment for me he is nowhere near Messi, not because his raw talent, but because his mentality... It can't look inside Messi's head, but Messi gives the impression that he doesn't care about being the best player...he wants the team to win, no matter who is the star. Ronaldo wants the team to win, but only if he is the one that made the team win...
 
gerd said:
I can't look inside Messi's head, but Messi gives the impression that he doesn't care about being the best player...he wants the team to win, no matter who is the star. Ronaldo wants the team to win, but only if he is the one that made the team win...
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I always stick up for Ronaldo because generally I find people think he's much more selfish than he actually is in my opinion. For me, he's not THAT selfish of a player.

BUT, what you've said above especially the bolded part IS true!
 
gerd said:
IMO ROnaldo has the tools to be the best player in the world, that means that he as everything to let his team shine.
The only thing that he lacks is his mentality. He is so obsessed with being the best player (in a team sports) that the team suffers because of it.
The best example still is the first Man Utd-Barcelona final. The press (who always need a story) saw this match as the ultimate match between Messi and Ronaldo and not between two teams. Ronaldo did lem himself carry away with all this nonsense and he was desperately to win the match by himself. Until Eto'o's goal (Barcelona's first) Man Utd was actually the better team but the ywere hardly dangerous because every time they could be threatening Ronaldo tried a long distance shot instead of passing to a better placed team mate.

It's ironical/tragical that the day Ronaldo stops trying to be the best individual player (and then would play for the team) he would have a much better chance at being the best individual player. At the moment for me he is nowhere near Messi, not because his raw talent, but because his mentality... It can't look inside Messi's head, but Messi gives the impression that he doesn't care about being the best player...he wants the team to win, no matter who is the star. Ronaldo wants the team to win, but only if he is the one that made the team win...
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Out of curiosity, what do you think about the fact one of the best finisher in the world is forced to play on the wings? (I'm talking about Villa)
 
Baxter said:
Out of curiosity, what do you think about the fact one of the best finisher in the world is forced to play on the wings? (I'm talking about Villa)
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He's doing well but it's obvious that between Messi and Villa, it is better to play Messi on center. Villa is playing well lately and getting into flow again after his serious injury that almost retired him. Obviously his natural space is the area, but he has adapted very well.

By the way, Villa has bern playing as left winger in the national team since the world cup, that is before signing for barcelona, but sometimes he swaps positions and usually he ends inside the area because the side backs usually do the usual winger stuff.

In fact, Villa has scored in all the important matches and finals, and his absence (plus losing Abidal and other injuries) was one of the reasons why the team underperformed at the key moments last year.
 
drekkard said:
He's doing well but it's obvious that between Messi and Villa, it is better to play Messi on center. Villa is playing well lately and getting into flow again after his serious injury that almost retired him. Obviously his natural space is the area, but he has adapted very well.

By the way, Villa has bern playing as left winger in the national team since the world cup, that is before signing for barcelona, but sometimes he swaps positions and usually he ends inside the area because the side backs usually do the usual winger stuff.

In fact, Villa has scored in all the important matches and finals, and his absence (plus losing Abidal and other injuries) was one of the reasons why the team underperformed at the key moments last year.
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Exactly.
 
Sometimes I think about a 4-4-2 or 4-3-1-2 whith they in the center, Villa as CF and Messi as free SS. It's a lot of years Barcelona don't play with 2 strikers, isn't it?
 
That would completely ruin the current system, which is based in not playing with a CF (Messi actually plays as an AMF). This system allows multiple players to get into the CF zone at any time and surprise defenders that most of the time don't have anyone to mark and suddenyl have to track multiple players incoming.

That's why Messi, Cesc, Xavi, Villa, etc... can surprise defenders with constant cuts. It's a very smart system that Guardiola created (and one of the biggest revolutions in modern football) and Del Bosque adopted for the national team as well. The results are there.

Why change that for something more classical? To have Villa score more goals? He scores +20 if he doesn't get injured. Messi produces +100 (84 goals and 30 assists). If you put someone as a striker, automatically all the good things fo this system banish and Messi starts colliding with Villa.

That's why Eto'o, Henry and Ibra had to end up playing in the wing to adapt to this system. That's why Neymar would fit in perfectly.
 
I think you'll find that Spalletti was the one who created the striker less 4-6-0. Man Utd were another side who used it a lot, mainly in Europe, prior to Guardiola's appointment.
 
Good points and surely similar tactics on paper, but it's not the same at all.

Guardiola put the team in a very compressed zone in the rival pitch and is based on midfielders continually swapping positions between themselves and cutting in and out. Then, if the team "falls" to a side, wingers become midfielders and cut inside at the same time that side backs turn into wingers. And no one goes near the position of a theorical CF for ages. All this makes defenders get confused and creates a vacuum of offensive players in the danger zone. It's ironic that this vacuum is the most dangerous weapon.

Rival CBs have no one to mark, but any player can cut in. It's impossible to track all players all the time and the movements in the wings are a diversion, so when the team finally does the final blow, suddenly a lot of players arrive to the danger zone and defenders have a hard time coordinating all at once.

And that's the reason why some people find it boring. Guardiola liked to cook slow, to make the opponent get cornered in its pitch and hypnotize it with possession, then... bam! A quick blow when the pieces connect and suddenly 2 or 3 players arrive at CF positions.

And it's very hard to stop Barcelona doing this. Only a couple of teams have succeeded, and with a lot of luck. In a timespan of 4.5 years, you can count with your fingers the matches in which Barcelona was inferior to its rival and really deserved to lose.

An incredible skill on keeping ball possession is needed, and a great tactical discipline and lots of deffensive awareness because your defenders are at the halfline during 90% of the match, leaving 50 meters behind their backs.

There is no real comparison of a previous team playing like this. Spalleti may have used the same formations on paper, the same way Arrigo Sacchi played a standard 4-4-2. But what's important is how you develop this formation and make it move. How does it work offensively and deffensively. What Pep did here is new and the most important tactical revolution in the last 2 decades.

And all what I have written in this post (specifically Pep being the most revolutionary coach in 20 years) comes from an Arrigo Sacchi interview. I just translated it with my rusty English.
 
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5 goals in one match, for me he's the best player in Spain. Especially when you consider that Falcao doesnt have the all-star supporting cast that Messi and Ronaldo have. It's like the driver of a Volkswagen keeping pace with drivers of Ferraris and Lamborghinis.
 
Enough can't be said about Falcao!!

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Messi breaks Gerd Muller's record that stood for 40 years!!

:WORSHIP: All hail the Greatest! :WORSHIP:
 
It also says something about Gerd Muller, that his record has been standing for 40 years.
IMO he has to be the best out and out goal scorer ever.

Ask the average evo-web member about the 10 best forwards ever and you will find no player that played before Van Basten. Muller was a legend.

Messi is indeed the Greatest.
 
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