FCBnews

Abidal Out For 6-8 Weeks

Tue, 9 Feb 2010 10:25:32 -0600

If you were already worried about how we would form a defence for Sunday's game at Atletico Madrid, today the news got worse with a thigh injury to Eric Abidal which the firsts tests say will keep him out of action for between six and eight weeks. It's a great shame because Eric has been in such fantastic form recently and we will miss his speed at the back. It's been a bad week for injuries as we already have Dani Alves out for three weeks and Toure Yaya for ten days. Added to this we will be without Piqué and Marquez on Sunday due to the red cards in Saturday's victory over Getafe which means we only have four first team defenders available. The logical back four will see a Milito and Chygrynskiy partnership in the centre with Puyol at right back and Maxwell on the left. Marc Bartra and Andreu Fontas have been called up from Barça Atletic to train with the first team as cover.

We should remember that we have usually responded well to a rearranged defence, against Getafe we saw Maxwell, Toure, Milito and Abidal across the back, while nobody can forget that we won the Champions League Final against Manchester United with a back four of Puyol, Toure, Piqué and Sylvinho. However, this weekend we are going to be more stretched than ever, and this for a game with Atletico where we nearly always have crazy games, and Forlan and Agüero will be keen to repeat last year's 4-3 win over us at the Calderon.

Barça 2 Getafe 1

Sat, 6 Feb 2010 12:00:12 -0600

Barça earned another three points tonight after a heroic 2-1 win over Getrafe. An early goal from Leo Messi seemed to have put us on the road to an easy victory but the game was complicated by the sending off of Gerard Piqué after 25 minutes. However, we adapted superbly to the circumstances and had the better chances during the rest of the game, Xavi scored our second midway through the second half and Getafe had to wait until injury time to pull a goal back after Rafa Marquez gave away a penalty. Marquez was also sent off for this foul and we therefore finioshed the game with nine men but fortunately there was not time for Getafe to look for the equalizer.

Barça had to change plans after Dani Alves noticed a muscle twinge during the pre-match warm-up which meant Maxwell had to come in at right back, and we also had a return to the team for Toure Yaya, Seydou Keita and Gabi Milito. We didn't notice any negative signs from the changes and began the game in excellent form, it's true that Getafe rested Casquero and Manu with an eye on their Copa del Rey semi-final and in the first twenty minutes it looked like we could be looking at a big win. Messi put us in front after seven minutes curling in a beauty from 25 yards after Toure had laid the ball back to him, and Messi had three more good chances in the opening spell, the best after a fantastic move in the 19th minute after combining with Maxwell and Ibrahimovic.

The game changed in the 25th minute after we failed to clear the ball, Piqué attempted to dribble the ball out but he let the ball run too far and he jumped in to try and recover the ball, unfortunately he committed a nasty looking foul and the ref didn't hesitate to show him the red card. I don't think there was any malicious intent on Piqué's part and many players escape without punishment for deliberate fouls but Piqué paid for his mistake and suddenly things were not nearly as comfortable as they had been.

Toure moved into defence but for a few minutes we looked disorganised, Valdés twice had to save efforts from Miku, but as we approached half time Xavi had a chance with a header and then Messi sent Ibrahimovic through but after dribbling to the side of the keeper his shot was cleared off the line by a defender.

Soldado had a good chance early in the second half when he met a cross from the right and Valdés had to be alert to save. Soon after Guardiola brought on Busquets for Ibrahimovic and we switched to a 4-4-1 formation with Messi on his own up front. However, with Busquets doing the holding job in midfield, Xavi, Keita and Iniesta had more freedom to support Messi, and we began to see some fantastic work from Messi and Iniesta to keep possession and also to create chances. In the 59th minute Messi, Xavi and Iniesta combined to set up Keita who missed a fantastic chance, shooting into the sidenetting.

Then in the 67th minute Abidal broke up a Getafe attack, the ball came to Marquez who played the ball forward to Xavi in the centre circle, Xavi played the ball right to Messi who set off on a superb run towards the edge of the penalty area, all the defence followed Messi which left Xavi open to receive Messi's pass and coolly beat the keeper at the near post to put us two up.

Getafe struggled to put us under any pressure and our defence held firm with an especially good performance from Milito, but the defence didn't have too much to do thanks mainly to the excellent possession football from Xavi, Iniesta and Messi. Near the end Keita had another great chance which he missed but by then it wasn't so important. Getafe's goal at the end was anecdotal but it was the first league goal we have conceded since the draw with Villarreal at the start of January.

We should be very satisfied with the performance tonight, after some good attacking early on the team rose to the circumstances after Piqué's dismissal and tactically we were superb. As we had done against Real Madrid when we were down to ten men we concentrated on keeping possession rather than defending deep and with Xavi, Iniesta and Messi we have a trio who are experts in keeping the ball. We should also be happy with Maxwell who filled in well at right back, and I was delighted to see such a solid performance from Gabi Milito, with Piqué playing a bit below his level of last season we may even see Milito winning a place in the first choice eleven if he continues like this.

Barça: Valdés 7.5; Maxwell 7.5, Piqué 5, Milito 8, Abidal 7.5; Xavi 8, Toure 7 (Marquez m58, 6.5), Keita 6; Messi 9, Ibrahimovic 6 (Busquets m52, 6.5), Iniesta 8.5 (Pedro m90, --).

Goals: m7 Messi 1-0, m67 Xavi 2-0, m94 Soldado (pen) 2-1.

Barça yellow cards: m24 Maxwell, m26 Xavi, m82 Busquets.

Barça red cards: m25 Piqué, m92 Marquez

Attendance: 74,859

Preview: Barça - Getafe

Fri, 5 Feb 2010 11:07:59 -0600

Dani Alves is fit again and should return to the team for tomorrow night's game with Getafe at Camp Nou (kick off 8pm). However, captain Carles Puyol is suspended for the game and we should not forget that we have only lost two games all season, against Rubin Kazan and Sevilla, and Puyol missed both these games. Puyol's absence will mean that Pep Guardiola has to chose again between Rafa Marquez, Dmytro Chygrynskiy and Gabi Milito for who to partner Gerard Piqué in the centre of defence. He will also have to decide again between Sergio Busquets and Toure Yaya, and between Pedro and Thierry Henry. I think that if Toure doesn't get a game tomorrow it will be the clearest sign yet that Busquets has Guardiola's preference and I'm sure we will once more start to hear the rumours of a move to the Premiership for Toure.

Getafe's coach Michel will have to make do without the injured Gavilan, Celestini and Adrian, and the suspended Pedro Leon. However, Getafe have a decent team and are currently 7th in the table on 31 points while they have also reached the Copa del Rey semi finals. Due to their cup run we may have a slight advantage as they played the first leg of the semi final on Wednesday night, losing 2-0 at Sevilla, so we are in the uncommon position of having had more time than our opponent to prepare tomorrow's game. We have struggled in the last two home games against Getafe and both games in April 2008 and November 2008 ended in draws. We will have to watch out for the likes of Juan Albin and Casquero, but the real dangerman is Roberto Soldado who has scored ten league goals so far this season, and if it wasn't for the competition of David Villa and Fernando Torres he would surely have won more than his two international appearances for Spain.

Getafe had their first draw in the league last wekend when they failed to do better than a 0-0 draw at home to Racing who were down to ten men for most of the second half. Their away record stands as three wins and seven defeats while scoring 11 and conceding 16 but they have won in the league at Sevilla which proves they are capable of competing with the best. Apart from the two draws at Camp Nou in 2008, Getafe have played three other league games at Camp Nou and lost all three.

With Real Madrid still only five points behind we cannot afford to slip up in this type of game, but it is precisely this type of game that can cause us problems. We will need Messi, Xavi and Iniesta to continue with their good form, and hopefully Ibrahimovic can get his name back on the scoresheet as there is no doubt that he could do with a goal to get the doubters off his back. I have to admit to not feeling too confident about this match so I will be happy with a narrow victory however scrappy it may be.

Possible starting XI: Valdés; Alves, Marquez, Piqué, Abidal; Xavi, Toure, Iniesta; Messi, Ibrahimovic, Henry.

My prediction: Barça 2 Getafe 1

Who Will Be Barça's Next President?

Wed, 3 Feb 2010 10:39:41 -0600

As most of you will know Joan Laporta is coming to the end of his mandate and there will be elections on Jun 13 to see who will replace him as Barça's next president. These elections can be very unpredictable as was seen in 2003 when Laporta came from well behind in the polls to defeat the favourite Luis Bassat. This time round the early favourite is Sandro Rosell who is very well known by culés, having formed part of Laporta's original board of directors and been credited with the signing of Ronaldinho. I wrote more about Rosell at the time of the mocion de censura against Laporta in the summer 2008 (Click here to read what I said then).

I think it is normal that Rosell is the early favourite precisely because he is so well known and has been the focus for nearly any opposition against Laporta in the last few years. However, the other main candidate, Alfons Godall, is not so well known by the fans. Godall it seems, has been chosen by Laporta from within the board to continue with the same way of running the club. Johan Cruyff has already come out in support of Godall which should help his candidacy.

Of the other candidates who have stated their intention to stand we have Agusti Benedito, Jaume Guixa, Jordi Medina and Jaume Ferrer but it seems unlikely that any of them can mount a serious challenge. Often candidates begin a campaign with the sole intention of making a pact with one of the bigger candidates in order to get a place on the board if said candidate wins. The only other name who might be able to make a serious challenge for the presidency is ex-vice-president Ferran Soriano who resigned from Laporta's team in July 2008, although so far Soriano has made no commitment to running.

I have to say that it is not easy to choose right now between the candidates but I would probably lean towards Godall because it should mean things don't change too much, and whatever you may think about Joan Laporta as a person I don't think anyone can say he has done a bad job in running the club since taking over from the disastrous Joan Gaspart in 2003. Rosell frightens me a bit as I feel he would want to change things where they don't need changing, but that is just a hunch of mine. I reserve the right to change my opinion over the coming months and I will be listening to see if there is anything interesting coming from the mouths of the candidates apart from the obvious claims along the lines of signing Cesc Fabregas or whoever.

Unfortunately, at the end of the day I do not hold out any hope of the new incumbent turning out to be a nice guy or a football genius. These guys are businessmen who generally use Barça to further their own importance within the elite of Catalan society. Until we get an ex-player, whether it be Cruyff or Guardiola or whoever one day, it is unlikely that we will have a likeable person as president who truly puts the club first. However, I tend to separate what I think about these people as people from whether I believe they can do a good job or not. I didn't like Nuñez as a person but he did a good job, Laporta often comes across as a bit of a dickhead but he has also run the club well. I just pray that we don't get another like Gaspart who was both an unpleasant person and an awful president to go with it. Who would you vote for?

Player Of The Month: January 2010

Mon, 1 Feb 2010 08:29:13 -0600

Some might say that we had mixed fortunes in January, we lost our first points at home in the 1-1 draw with Villarreal and then we were knocked out of the Copa del Rey by Sevilla, however, we won five out of seven games with a goal difference of sixteen goals for and only three against which can hardly be looked at badly, especially if we consider we were only two points above Real Madrid at the start of the month and we have now extended our lead to five points.

I had a list of eight players who I thought might make it into the top five for January but having now checked through my player ratings for the month and worked out the averages I can inform you that the winner is Leo Messi for the third time this season. It is great to see that Messi has continued to be in good form since winning all the individual awards for 2009, many players show a drop in form after winning such things but Messi is hungry for more, and six goals in six games this month including that sublime chip against Tenerife prove it.

I have to admit I was hoping that Eric Abidal would win as he has been fantastic this month but in the end he will have to settle for second place. Eric was my man of the match in the 4-0 win over Sevilla and also in Saturday's win at Sporting, he achieved an excellent average rating of 7.40 but this was just below Messi's average of 7.416.

I'm glad to announce a return to the top five, for the first time this season, for Andres Iniesta who came third with an average of 7.143. Last season it was in February, March and April that Iniesta really hit top form, let's hope that we see a similar finish to the season from him this time round.

Xavi Hernandez is fourth this month and he continues to demonstrate that he is the most consistent player at the club, he scored twice this month, once at Sevilla in the cup and then again in the 0-3 win at Valladolid.

Fifth place goes to Victor Valdés who has only conceded one goal in five games this month, he really deserves to be higher but it just shows how good the competition is.

Just out of the top five this month are Carles Puyol, Dani Alves and Pedro Rodriguez, all three can be very happy with their contribution this month but again it proves how tough it is to make the top five especially when Messi, Xavi and Iniesta are in form.

So to recap the top five for January 2010 are as follows:

Leo Messi
Eric Abidal
Andres Iniesta
Xavi Hernandez
Victor Valdés

Sporting Gijon 0 Barça 1

Sat, 30 Jan 2010 12:16:15 -0600

Barça continue the march to retain La Liga this season after a 0-1 win over Sporting Gijon in El Molinon. A goal from Pedro Rodriguez, who was preferred over Thierry Henry, after half an hour was enough to earn the three points, but the failure to convert our dominance into more goals meant we had to suffer a couple of nervous moments in the final minutes.

There was not a lot of action in the first ten minutes but we did not take long to take control of the game. In the 12th minute Messi played a fantastic nutmeg before slipping the ball forward to Xavi who flicked it on for Iniesta who got into the area but his shot hit Sporting's keeper Juan Pablo on the shoulder and flew over the bar. A minute later Pedro put the ball in the net but the goal was disallowed for an offside on Ibrahimovic who had headed Iniesta's cross against the post.

There was little sign of danger from Sporting apart from a weak shot wide from Bilic and in the 27th minute Bilic had Sporting's best chance of the game but Valdés saved his header comfortably. at the other end Ibrahimovic blasted one chance over and Pedro put in a dangerous low cross that found nobody. Then in the 30th minute Messi was fouled in our half but typically he tried to play on as he still had the ball. The referee blew the foul and Messi took the kick quickly to Iniesta, admittedly Messi was ten yards from where the foul had taken place but the ref allowed play to continue and Iniesta picked out a fantastic through ball to Pedro who had a clear run on goal and he coolly beat Juan Pablo at his near post for his sixth league goal of the season.

Messi had a chance for a second soon after but he fired across the face of the goal, and Sporting just managed to clear a dangerous cross from Iniesta as we piled on the pressure. In the 40th minute Xavi played a good ball into Ibrahimovic but a defender did enough to stifle our striker's effort, but we ended the first half well maintaining possession comfortably.

The second half began with heavy rain falling and both teams would notice the heavy conditions as the game went on. Iniesta had a chance in the 52nd minute after a good pull back from Pedro but he pulled his shot wide. Victor Valdés had little work to do apart from stopping a powerful low free kick that went straight at him, while at the other end Messi tried to catch Juan Pablo off his line with a shot from 50 yards but the Sporting keeper got back in time to save. Then in the 65th minute Pedro set up Messi with a good chance but Messi's side foot shot went wide of the far post.

We looked like we would get a second in the 73rd minute but Pedro missed an excellent chance after Xavi sent Messi into the area, Messi's cross was touched by the goalkeeper and fell to Pedro 10 yards out but he blazed his shot well over. Then a minute later Xavi played the ball into Ibrahimovic who turned the ball goalwards where Pedro went in the the ball with a defender just a yard out but the defender got in first to force the ball out for a corner.

Our failure to find a second goal was a bit worrying but Sporting were not finding a way past our defence. As we moved towards the 90th minute Pedro and Ibrahimovic both had chances saved which meant we had to face a couple of free kicks from dangerous positions in injury time but we held firm at the back to run out deserved winners.

The scoreline might suggest that we didn't play particularly well but we generally controlled the game very well against a team with a good home record. The fact that Real Madrid only managed a 0-0 draw here shows that this could be a very important victory. Xavi, Iniesta and Messi combined very well today and it is very positive that these three players all seem to be in good form at the moment, but my man of the match goes to Eric Abidal who is in his best form since signing for Barça. There should also be a mention for Rafa Marquez who had a much better game than his recent appearances, and perhaps the only negative point from the game (apart from Puyol's 5th yellow card) was another below par performance from Zlatan Ibrahimovic who now hasn't scored in the last six league games; having scored 11 in the first 14 league games he now hasn't scored since his penalty against Espanyol on the 12th December.

Barça: Valdés 7; Puyol 6, Marquez 7, Piqué 6, Abidal 8; Xavi 7.5, Busquets 6.5, Iniesta 7.5; Messi 7.5, Ibrahimovic 5.5, Pedro 7 (Bojan m91, --).

Goal: m30 Pedro 0-1

Barça yellow cards: m59 Pedro, m81 Messi, m93 Puyol (misses next match).

Preview: Sporting Gijon - Barça

Fri, 29 Jan 2010 12:08:01 -0600

Barça begin the second half of the league season with a trip to El Molinon to face Sporting Gijon tomorrow (kick off 8pm). We will be without Dani Alves who has a slight calf strain and Seydou Keita who is suspended after picking up his fifth yellow card of the season in last week's win at Valladolid. However, Sergio Busquets is fit again and Toure Yaya is back after the African Cup, and the big question tomorrow is which of these two players will get the job of the defensive midfield role. There was talk before the African Cup that Busquets was getting more minutes to give him the match practice to have him ready to cover for Toure during his absense during the African Cup. Tomorrow there will be no such excuse and we should see who Guardiola really sees as first choice. I feel he is going to stick with Busquets.

Last season, after picking up only one point in our first two games, we achieved our first league victory with a 1-6 win, but the game was not as simple as the result suggests (Click here for a report on that match). This season Sporting are doing better than they were when we met them in Gijon, and they are currently 10th on 24 points. They have a decent home record with five wins, three draws and just two defeats, and they have one of the best home defensive records with just six goals conceded in those ten games. However, they are not in good form recently and have only taken four points from their last seven games. The player we will have to watch most closely is left sided attacker Diego Castro who has six league goals to his name so far this season.

Our away record in games against Sporting is not great: we have won 11, drawn 11 and lost 16 of our previous league encounters in Gijon, but we should still hope that tomorrow is a good opportunity to increase our 5-point lead over Real Madrid who are away to Deportivo where they have suffered a lot in recent years. With Alves out we will probably see Carles Puyol filling in at right back and it will be interesting to see who Guardiola will prefer out of Chygrynskiy, Marquez and MIlito to partner Gerard Piqué in central defence. While up front I expect Thierry Henry will continue on the left despite all the calls for Pedro to get the role. I expect us to win this game but by a smaller margin than we managed last season.

Other news just in is that the elections to see who will replace Joan Laporta as club president have been set for June 13. I'll try to write some more on this subject and the candidates soon.

Barça's squad for the game: Valdés, Pinto, Puyol, Marquez, Piqué, Milito, Chygrynskiy, Maxwell, Abidal, Toure, Busquets, Xavi, Iniesta, Messi, Bojan, Ibrahimovic, Pedro, Henry.

Possible starting XI: Valdés; Puyol, Piqué, Milito, Abidal; Xavi, Busquets, Iniesta; Messi, Ibrahimovic, Henry.

My prediction: Sporting 1 Barça 3

Fcbnews Quiz #4

Thu, 28 Jan 2010 09:57:16 -0600

Are they getting more difficult? Well maybe, but if they were easy it would be answered in five minutes. This time I want to know:

1) The names of the eleven players in the picture (or as many as you can get)

2) Our opponents and the occasion.

3) The final score and our goalscorer(s).

4) Who our coach was at the time.

5) The exact date of the match.

The Season So Far

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 09:32:27 -0600

Having reached the halfway point in this season's league it is time for a little reflection on how things are going. It is true that the team is not quite playing at the extraordinary levels set last season but the balance so far this time round can only be described as very positive. At the same stage last season we had accumulated 50 points from the first 19 league games while scoring 59 goals and conceding 13, this season we have one point less and have netted 49 goals with only 10 against. However, we have also added the Spanish Supercopa, the European Supercup and the Club World Cup to our trophy collection while the negative side has been the elimination from the Copa del Rey.

Last season we stood out for our incredible attacking football but this season it is our defence that deserves a bigger slice of the credit for our success. We have only conceded 10 goals in the league so far which gives us the best defensive record of all the top leagues in Europe. And in our 34 official matches this season we have only let in 18 goals while keeping 20 clean sheets. Victor Valdés has been in excellent form despite a couple of slips in December and it seems incredible that he has not yet been included in Vicente del Bosque's plans, of course Iker Casillas has won the right to be first choice but Valdés is surely a better keeper than either Pepe Reina or Diego Lopez. Dani Alves still offers more going forward but his defending has also been top class while Eric Abidal has silenced his doubters with some consistently good performances. Carles Puyol has been proving me wrong by returning to his best, and perhaps the only one of our first choice back four who is a bit below last season's level is Gerard Piqué. The back up in defence has not been great but in the fifteen games that we have started with Valdés, Alves, Piqué, Puyol and Abidal we have only conceded five goals, an extremely impressive record.

There has been a fair bit of dissent from fans for Pep Guardiola's decision to prefer Sergio Busquets over Toure Yaya in midfield, but apart from a couple of goals given away by poor back headers he has generally been very solid. Toure will be home soon after Ivory Coast's surprise defeat to Algeria in the African Cup quarter finals, so it will be interesting to see if Busquets continues in the role or not. Xavi Hernandez who is 30 today, continues to run things for us magnificently in midfield and has fully deserved to be considered the best midfielder in the world today, his goal against Valladolid, where he participated in the build up with a deft flick before sprinting forward to get onto Alves's cross, demonstrated his class. Andres Iniesta has taken a long time to get over his injury problems but he seems to be getting back to his best now and he will be vital for our push for Champions League and Liga in the next four months. Seydou Keita has been important when he has come in and his six league goals demonstrate his improvement.

If anything it is our forwards who are not at the same level as last season although fifteen league goals from Leo Messi make him La Liga's top scorer at the moment and this despite a noticeable drop in form after all the problems Argentina had to qualify for the World Cup. Zlatan Ibrahimovic soon became a favourite with fans and helped us to get over the loss of Samuel Eto'o, he has recently suffered a loss in form but we'll just have to hope this is temporary, his class has been demonstrated and I'm sure he will start scoring again soon. Thierry Henry is also struggling to find last season's form but this has been balanced by the enormous progression of Pedro Rodriguez whose goals have been vital especially in the Club World Cup and the European Supercup.

Perhaps some of the fringe players have been disappointing but despite doubts over the size of the squad we seem to be managing fine so far. We will have to hope that we continue to suffer few injuries to our key players, but I feel the lack of injuries cannot be put down to good fortune alone. Of course there is always an element of luck in this aspect but I believe it is also down to a better preparation; Pep Guardiola's training methods and stricter dietary regime are certainly having a positive effect and this is just one more thing that we should be grateful to Guardiola for. All in all there are plenty of reasons to be optimistic, we may have lost the Copa del Rey but we are clear favourites for La Liga and if things go our way there is no reason why we can't repeat our success in the Champions League in the Bernabeu on May 22.

Valladolid 0 Barça 3

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 15:09:16 -0600

Football Club Barcelona moved eight points clear of Real Madrid at the top of La Liga after a comfortable 0-3 win at Valladolid tonight. Two first half goals in the space of a minute from Xavi Hernandez and Dani Alves made the game relatively easy and Leo Messi completed the scoring in the second half with his 15th league goal of the season. At the half way stage in the league season this team continue to break records: we became only the fifth team in the history of La Liga to go the first half of the season unbeaten and we have become the team to let in the fewest goals away from home at this stage of the season with only four goals conceded so far on our travels. Much of this has to be down to Victor Valdés who had another good match, making three important saves to prevent Valladolid from getting back in the game.

The early exchanges were fairly even as Valladolid came out to pressurize us up the field. However, Seydou Keita had the first good chance of the game in the 8th minute but he misdirected his header from Xavi's corner, sending the ball well over the crossbar. Soon after Messi played a ball into the area to Alves who played a neat little flick back to Messi whose curling shot was well saved by Valladolid's keeper Villar. however, the pressure from Valladolid was causing us to lose the ball sloppily and in the 18th minute Pîqué gave a poor ball out of defence, the ball came forward to Diego Costa who toe poked a shot from the edge of the area and Valdés had to make a fine diving save to prevent us from going behind.

From possibly going 1-0 down within four minutes we were 0-2 up. In the 21st minute Iniesta played the ball out of defence to Xavi who played a delightful flick to Messi who played the ball wide to Alves motoring forward, Alves crossed to Xavi who had continued his run forward to meet the ball with a hooked volley that gave Villar no chance. Then a minute later Messi headed the ball on to Alves on the right and his cross/shot looped over Villar into the far corner. Did Alves intend to shoot? I don't think so but sometime the luck goes your way and suddenly it was all looking very complicated for Valladolid.

The two goal advantage made things much easier for us and we settled down to controlling the game with our typical passing game. We didn't need to do too much going forward though there was one great dribble into the area from Messi showing dazzling footwork but it came to nothing. It all seemed very easy but Valladolid could have pulled a goal back just before half time after a hand ball on the edge of the area from Piqué. Borja fired in a fierce free kick that Valdés saw late but he reacted in time to lift his arms to make another important stop.

However, it was a minor scare and we were back to controlling thing early in the second half. Iniesta had a half volley that went well over, and not long after he showed nice skills to create a shooting opportunity but his effort was weak and went straight at Villar. In the 56th minute Henry had a spectacular overhead kick effort saved but soon after we scored the third. Alves slipped the ball into Ibrahimovic who'd got goal side of the defence, his first control took the ball out wide but he had time to turn and send a low ball back to Messi running in and Messi met the ball first time to send a side footed shot high into the roof of the net.

Valladolid almost snatched a goal straight back but Valdés did brilliantly to stop a downward header that was bouncing up off the ground with an outstretched right hand. From here on though it was really just a question of whether we would score any more. Henry had a couple of efforts and Messi hit one just wide of the far post, then in the 70th minute Messi slipped away from two opponents before laying the ball right to Ibrahimovic but Villar did well to get a hand to Zlatan's shot.

There was little more action though near the end Villar tried to gift Messi a goal by passing straight at him but Messi was so surprised to receive the ball that he fluffed his control giving the ball straight back to the keeper. Valdés then spoilt an otherwise solid performance with a poor kick to Pele but the Valladolid substitute did not live up to his name and shot well wide.

We can generally be very satisfied with this performance despite some sloppiness in the first twenty minutes. Dani Alves was a monster once again on the right and despite my doubts about his intentions when he scored he was also involved in the other two goals and never stopped running all night. Valdés, as already mentioned, had a solid game in goal, and it is difficult to believe he still hasn't earned a call-up for the Spanish national team, while my other special mention tonight goes to Carles Puyol who was immense at the back. On the negative side Gerard Piqué was below par today, and up front Ibrahimovic and Henry did little to dispel the doubts over their form. However, we are on a good run now, having scored 12 goals in the last three league games without conceding. Real Madrid can reduce the gap to five points if they beat Malaga tomorrow but they will have to do something very special to stop us winning our 20th Liga this season.

Barça: Valdés 7.5; Alves 8.5, Piqué 5.5 (Milito m61, 6.5), Puyol 8, Abidal 7.5; Xavi 7.5, Keita 6.5 (Chygrynskiy m79, 6), Iniesta 7; Messi 7, Ibrahimovic 6, Henry 6 (Bojan m82, --).

Goals: m21 Xavi 0-1, m22 Alves 0-2, m56 Messi 0-3.

Barça yellow cards: m43 Piqué, m51 Keita (suspended for next game)