FC Barcelona vs. Bayern Munich, 0-3

[flywoman]

Broken but unbowed. No, wait... also bowed.

While I wasn't holding out high hopes for a comeback after Bayern Munich thrashed us 4-0 in the away leg, I didn't think that things could get more humiliating for Barcelona today. Apparently I was wrong.

The first half wasn't so bad. Although with Messi sitting hopefully on the bench (presumably in case it started to look like we had a snowball's chance in hell if only we could score a couple more goals) our attacks came to nothing, at least we played with spirit and also managed to keep a clean sheet. Even Pique was acting like a professional defender for a change, Bartra and Song were excellent, and Pedro managed at least one shot that caused Neuer to break a sweat.

That all changed when Robben was left undefended and scored the first goal less than five minutes in the second half. It was obvious that a switch had been flipped from "highly improbable" to "impossible" at that point. Tito Vilanova took off his valuable midfield veterans Xavi and Iniesta and replaced them with the more attack-minded Alexis and Thiago, leaving Messi on the bench. Roughly ten minutes later, Gerard Pique scored one of the most emphatic goals of his career - right into his own net. And three minutes after that, Muller managed to head the ball past Valdes in spite of being sandwiched between two defenders.

All credit to them, Real Madrid almost managed to get past Borussia Dortmund in yesterday's rematch, and they might have left the pitch heartbroken, but at least it was with their pride intact. Today's result was just embarrassing. Our forwards shot straight into the keeper's arms when they were on target at all, and if Tito and the board don't think we need to sign at least one world-class defender this summer and start benching Pique, they're blind. I'm almost starting to fear for the League.


Also, at least the Madrid match gave us this.

Comments

[jezziejay.livejournal.com]

I saw the last half hour or so of this match, and it was pretty painful. All the guys were talking about it the next day.

I really felt for Pique - it wasn't even one of those that just trickled or bounced badly - he belted it into the net. I couldn't believe it. You could sense during the last ten minutes that Barca just wanted to sink under the pitch. I almost couldn't watch.

Saw the Real match, too. Poor Jose (snorts) - rumour is rife that the special one is premiership bound next season.

[flywoman.livejournal.com]

I honestly didn't feel that bad for Pique because he's been awful for most of the last two seasons and this was just much more obvious. But yeah, it was an excellent strike, just into the wrong net. I'm sure he wished the ground could swallow him up. And everyone just gave up at that point if they hadn't already.

Rumor has it that Mou already has a deal lined up with Chelsea...