So in Gameweek 24 of the LaLiga Santander Barcelona hosted Real Valladolid at home.Barca being the table toppers and Valladolid struggling to avoid meant that most people thought this would a one sided clash with Barca with winning emphatically.Although Barca did win the match but it was far from emphatic or to say the least even convincing.
So Barca rested a few key players for this match consider UEFA Champions League tie against Lyon.They started withLuis Suarez,Nelson Semedo, Clement Langlet and Ivan Rakitic on the bench and Arthur who is already out injured.Dembele came back into the squad after the injury layoff and Thomas Vermaelan and Boateng also got a rare look in the starting line up.Valladolid played a full strength of their available squad for this tie as they wanted to salvage atleast one point from this game.
Valladolid got of to great start into the match and they were very threatening on the counters.
Barca from the starting itself looked very shaky upfront.Their was that lack of connection between the Barca frontline.The creativity was completely missing throughout the first half as Dembele was the only Barca player who even showed some spark.
It was not until the 43rd minutes the Barca got a breakthrough when Gerard Pique was brought down in the 18yard and Messi Converted the Resulting penalty.
Barca started of the second half on a brighter note creating a few chances but only for Jordi Masip to deny them.In the 85 Minute Coutinho was once again brought down in the Penalty box.Messi once again stepped up to take it but only Jordi Masip saved it this time.
Overall Barca were very poor in this match. Usually when Messi plays he is the best player on the Pitch but today that was not the case and for that matter he was not even in the Top 3 for me.(Yeah he was forth).Jordi Masip by far was the best player followed by Vidal and Pique. Although messi did not do much wrong but Valladolid players always kept a close check on him.He always had 4-5 players marking him whenever he had the ball.Masip was so excellent tonight.The former Barca Academy graduate showed good reading of the game and great anticipation skills to keep the score down to 1-0.Suarez came on in the 60th minute and was very bad.He had almost 2-3 clear goal scoring opportunities but he failed to convert any of them.Pique was impressive he with vermaelan kept good check on Unal as well as Sergio Guardiola.Alba had a bad game he showed no signs of linking up the attackers and so was Roberto. Vidal!! ohh!! What can I say about you.Once deemed surplus to Ernesto velverde's needs, he has slowly become one the team's mainstays.He worked hard throughout the match and made sure Barca dominated the midfield.
In a couple of days time Barca travel away to Lyon and I know if they play this it is going to be a long night for the Catalan giants in France.Hopefully Suarez will find his scoring boots and will take some pressure of Messi.The fullbacks would also need to perform much better if Barca are to take anything away from France.