Real Madrid 0 Barcelona 2
Messi 76, Messi 87
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Mr Nasty blew another Champions League semi-final last night.
He got it badly wrong by playing a game of attrition which backfired.
And he got sent off for his reaction to Pepe\’s red card.
After that, Messi scored two fabulous goals.
Regrettably, Jose Mourinho decided to turn Real Madrid into Porto by playing kick, bollock and bite football. Seven years ago his Porto players were underdogs who dived, obstructed, argued, backed into defenders, stuck fingers into their eyes. Now he tells superstars to win ugly.
By making this showcase game into a series of abrasive duels and spiteful incidents, Mourinho showed how much he loves to aggravate, provoke and intimidate.
When Pepe lunged in for a 50-50 in 61 minutes, Dani Alves saw his boot coming. The ball was dropping below Pepe’s boot and he went over the ball to clatter into Dani Alves’s shin. When the right back flipped over like an acrobat, German ref Wolfgang Stark sent Pepe off.
Having seen six replays this morning, Pepe clearly chose to kick Dani Alves, rather than kick the ball. He ignored the ball and went for the man. It wasn\’t mistimed. It was a calculated foul that deserved a red card.
Interestingly, Barcelona were forced to use Puyol at left back because all their left backs were injured. And they had to use a short midfielder, Mascherano, at centreback.
But Madrid were never able to attack Mascherano in the air or Puyol on the ground .Why? Because Mourinho put square pegs in round holes. If Pepe had played at centreback, Sergio Ramos could have overlapped on the right and given old Puyol a hard time, helping Ronaldo.
Instead of seizing that opportunity in a first leg at home, Mourinho planned to disrupt Barcelona\’s rhythm as much as possible and nick a goal from somewhere. But he disrupted his own team so much that they only had about 30% possession and never looked like scoring.
Ozil is a gifted fourth attacker, not a striker or a winger.
The razor-sharp German\’s main value is joining an attack at speed, or speeding up a slow attack, or exploding forward to provide a killer pass, or going through for a shot himself. In last night’s set-up, Ozil could not do any of that because he had his back to goal too much. He was playing too far forward to use his intelligence and pace, so his talents were wasted.
Amazingly, Mourinho left Benzema and Higuain, his best two strikers, on the bench. When he needed a goal, he left them there and brought on Adebarndoor to make tackles and smack defenders. Ade whacked Busquets in the face with his hand and should have been sent off. But he only got a yellow card.
When Dutch winger Afellay came on for Pedro in 70, I wondered if he might break the deadlock with one of his PSV thunderbolts.
One of the few moments of note was a sharp pass into the box by Messi to Xavi, who hit a first time shot that Casillas saved. That was in the first half. Ozil had a chance when a Ronaldo shot came back off Victor Valdes. Everything else was forgettable.
Overall, watching the first 75 minutes, I was thinking : I prefer football ! I wish I could see a game of football !
Then the world’s best player, the planet’s calmest footballer, the superstar with the smallest ego, scored twice.
After 76 minutes, Messi scored a Denis Law goal from a fine Afellay cross to the near post.
Then, after 87 minutes, he scored a Maradona goal. What footballer have you ever seen who can score both those goals in a mayhem match like this? Nobody.
Only Lionel Messi could score a stab-goal at the near post and then score a slalom goal as well. Maybe George Best in his pomp could have scored both those goals in a brutal battle like last night.
In four clasicos so far this season, Mourinho has had Sergio Ramos sent off in the 5-0 defeat at the Nou Camp, Albiol sent off when he grabbed David Villa round the neck and threw him on the ground to concede a penalty, Di Marie walked in the Cop Del Rey Final which they won in extra time, and now Pepe.
A brutal, dispiriting spectacle last night but, thankfully, the best team won by scoring two beautiful goals.
We saw it, Barcelona\’s Gerard Pique said it, “We were the only team that wants to play football.”
Massive night for Pep Guardiola. His substitute turned the game.
Afterwards, Mourinho produced the most paranoid rant in the history of European football.
Uefa\’s reaction to that outburst is eagerly awaited.
Bottom line, Mourinho\’s game- plan was self-destructive.
This fiasco could cost him his job.
PS. A Dani Alves-Pepe video clip in Spanish and has been viewed by 1.2m people already