Thursday Round Up
Thursday, 26 November 09, 09:44 AM · Comments (11)
Some stories have come out since our victory over Inter Milan on Tuesday. One of the most interesting is the miraculous return from injury and swine flu by Eric Abidal. When Abidal picked up his muscle injury in the left thigh it was said that he would need three weeks to recover and yet he was playing ten days later. Besides this he also recoved from swine flu after going down with the virus on Friday. On Monday evening he was training apart still wearing a facemask and he didn't get the all clear to play until 7pm on the day of the game. Some of his team mates apparently couldn't believe it when Pep Guardiola announced the team. The other news on Abidal of course is that yesterday he renewed his contract with the club until 2012.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic was due to start against Inter but he felt a slight twinge again in his hamstring on Monday, the club kept this secret but the chances of him aggravating the injury increased which is why he started on the bench. Leo Messi was only on the bench for psychological reasons and it has now been reported that he was never going to be risked regardless of how the game was going. Both players are continuing their respective recovery programmes with Sunday's game with Madrid in mind but I think if there are no more set-backs they will both make it in time. Dani Alves also trained separately from his team mates today having taken a knock on the ankle on Tuesday night but he should be fine by Sunday, while the good news is that Toure Yaya trained with the group and should also be fine for Sunday, though after Busquets' display on Tuesday he may not get in the starting eleven.
Other news is the announcement of the 23 players who will travel to Abu Dhabi next month for the Club World Cup. Gabi Milito has been rewarded with a place but it is unlikely he will feature while two players from Barça Atlètic, Johnathan dos Santos and 20-year-old keeper Rubén Miño, have also been included. The 23 with their squad numbers for the tournament are as follows:
Valdés (1), Alves (2), Piqué (3), Marquez (4), Puyol (5), Xavi (6), Jeffren (7), Iniesta (8), Ibrahimovic (9), Messi (10), Bojan (11), Miño (12), Pinto (13), Henry (14), Keita (15), Busquets (16), Pedro (17), Milito (18), Maxwell (19), Jonathan (20), Chygrynskiy (21), Abidal (22) y Touré Yaya (24).
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11 Comments · Add yours
We need this cup, I'm sure pep understands so too
nyways, Madrid first
Glad to know Messi and Ibrahimovic will play in the Clasico.
Lets take care of Galacticos II first and then lets get our first Club World Cup in Abu Dhabi.
Hope Milito gets back to full fitness and looking forward to seeing more of Jonathan and the other youngsters in the Club World Cup matches.
I have a feeling that they will both be fit aswell, if not then so be it, we smashed Inter without Messi and the Zlatan and with Henry, Iniesta and Bojan upfront I wouldnt be overly worried to be honest.
What did Bicuits do so special on Tuesday? Anyone care to tell me? Inter never were a threat going forward and basically let Barca play.
Toure is the first name on the starting lineup, its criminal how under rated this guy is.
He doesn't need to prove anything especially over Biscuits who I'm sorry is average and that's being nice when compared to Toure.
thanks to the whole Barca team...
If we beat Inter easily without Messi and Ibrahimovic , I don't think we'll have much trouble with Madrid . Besides Inter is a better team .
A resounding defeat of the over-hyped Galacticos would be demoralizing and total embarrassment !!
I think most football neutrals would be rooting for us to give a Real hammering to Madrid. This is primarily (in my opinion) because of the flawed football philosophy Madrid has about buying superstars and trying to make them play as a team. The sooner the Galacticos II experiment fails the better it is for the football world.
@The Evil That Men Do:
I'll agree that Toure is one of the most underrated players in world football. However it'd be unfair to compare a relatively young Biscuits to our superb midfield enforcer. Biscuits will develop into an excellent player with time and hopefully he will prove his critics wrong when the ACN comes around. Biscuits might not have had to do much against Inter but perhaps the greatest quality of a world class CDM is to go about his job quietly. If you look at the great CDMs like Makelele they simply went about their role and were hardly noticed compared to their attacking counterparts who used get the plaudits from fans and most commentators.
@Evil that men do
Biscuits??? boy that's a new one!!!! I like it!!!!
@Nic
NO CLASSICO PREVIEW!!!???
Preview please
Just on it, check back in an hour