The 2012-13 Season Thread Part 2 | Setting the record for setting records

What's the record for most records?

 

*can't quote due to the old thread being locked, but anyway (from Azulgrana)...

"I wouldn't say our defense isn't as good as it once was. We've hardly had the opportunities to play our best ones because of injuries and constant health issues coming up. We've only played with Alves-Puyol-Pique-Alba twice this season I believe and it resulted in two clean sheets.

And I don't get why anyone would criticize that. Can't expect any manager that came in would have the team pressing as high as they were under Pep because no one is as dedicated in getting players' commitment to the club like Guardiola is and it's also a very high risk thing. Tito was the man right next to him for four years who was able to see what the team didn't do so well and correct it; he's done that so far."

I'd definitely say our defense is worse than before. We concede way more, and that's how we're worse. You aren't as good as you'd be if all your players would be in top shape, you're as good as you perform on pitch.

Also, I'd say that we should expect the new manager to be as dedicated as Pep, since if you coach Barca, you better be fully dedicated. Tito has been that, although of course we've only seen so much from him (as the head coach).

Also, I fail to understand how is pressing high such a huge risk for us. We've done that for a long time, and it's just part of our tactics like everything else is.

 

The goal differential may not look quite so nice but we are scoring a ton:

 

Glad we are resting a bunch of starters, but with Leo on the list I expect he likely starts - especially after all his kind words about Celtic and their fans deserving to play the elimination round, that means Leo will see that Benfica lose and it is up to Celtic to get points from Spartak at home (celtic and benfica being level of 7 points now):
the coach has decided to rest Iniesta, Xavi, Mascherano, Pedro, Jordi Alba, and Cesc.
Leo Messi makes the squad, as he is only one goal away from Müller’s record of goals in a calendar year. The squad list of 18 players also includes B team footballers Tello, Deulofeu, Planas, Rafinha, Sergi Gómez, and Sergi Roberto.
Squad list: Valdés, Pinto, Piqué, Puyol, Villa, Messi, Thiago, Dos Santos, Sergio, Montoya, Adriano, Song, Sergi Gómez, Sergi Roberto, Deulofeu, Planas, Rafinha, and Tello.

 

I don't think you get what I'm saying.

Whenever Pep had Puyol, Pique, and Alves injured while he was in charge, our defense struggled then too. It's clear that we will suffer when our best defenders are out. But I am saying that hypothetically I don't see how our best backline right now compared to our best backline from 2009-2011 was any worse. Like I said, we've only seen our best defense out there twice this season and both times it resulted in clean sheets. We're replacing our best defenders when they're out with wingbacks and midfielders, it's no surprise to anyone when we concede a lot as a result. It's not even a 'defense'.

Tito has been great so far no doubt but it's a stretch to say he's as dedicated to the job as Pep was. That's not even anything bad, what Pep was doing for four years was very unhealthy and caused all his stress, hair loss, ageing, etc. He worked all day long every day on the team to make sure everything was perfect, I am sure no one in the world will ever see anything like that again.

And I'm not saying that the high pressing is a huge risk for the club, but for the players it is. We can't expect them to put that much effort for so many years when it will drain them physically and their level will eventually drop. Everything's been going well so far anyways so I wouldn't even complain about it. We make up for the lack of high pressing now by being more direct and much more attack minded than we used to be which is what gets us results.

 

I don't think our hypothetically best backline is worse than it has been, either. But that's something else than how good our defense is. If we need to smack midfielders etc to play as defs, resulting to worse defending than ideal line-up, it's our fault.

How is it a stretch? Pep seemed to give A LOT, but that's how it's supposed to go. I'm sure Tito works long days continuously as well, being about as dedicated as is possible.

Pressuring will drain, but we rotate players in order to save them, and pressuring also leads to us getting the ball -> not having to chase it -> maybe saving some energy.

Agreed on that everything has so far gone pretty well.

 

3 teams completely confirmed as eligible for us to draw in CL round of 16: Milan, Porto, and Arsenal (cannot draw #2 in group Real); tomorrow we cannot draw Celtic/Benfica #2 in our own group; we could draw Bayern but not Valencia; we can draw the Cluj/Galatasary #2; we can draw the #2 out of Shaktar/Juventus/Chelsea. So after tomorrow there will likely be just 5 teams we can draw - one of which is a gimme.

 

It's our fault for not buying natural defenders, but if we don't do that and have to play midfielders and wingbacks in central defense, then we only have ourselves to blame. But that wasn't my point, I was speaking strictly about Alves-Puyol-Pique-Alba, our current best backline when all available.

It is a stretch no doubt. We'll wait another year if you want though, and we'll see if Tito suffers the changes to his physical appearance that Pep did in his first 18 months. Plus I've never heard about Tito working just as much as Pep did in the job. Pretty sure we'd see more of the same like high pressing and interchanging positions between players like we used to, but we haven't. Again it's not a dig at Tito or anyone, if that's what you think that is.

We can rotate players but it still doesn't take away from the fact that they've worked ridiculously hard over the past four-five years playing like this, it takes a big effect on the human being to put in so much effort for so long. It eventually drains you to a point, ie. Xavi suffering from burnout more than once in the past two years.

 

Fair enough. But still: A-P-P-A is not the same as "our defence".

Changes in physical appearances? Tito doesn't need to lose to convince me that he is dedicated. Obviously Tito works like a beast, wouldn't be the chosen coach otherwise. I don't think it's a dig on Tito, just thinking that Tito is as dedicated as can be.

Yes, but footballers drain out anyway. I mean I have hard time believing our style of play under Tito is in any significant way less demanding physically for our players than it was under Pep. Xavi is 32 years old top level midfielder. How many in his age group are not occasionally burnt out?

 

Messi now needs to break Zarra record next

 

I still think this is wrong, we have 3 other strikers and its only Messi who's always in scoresheet. If that Chelsea game situation happen again (off course not against them this time), we might have some problem.

 

Special visitor (not a hoax this time I hope):

 

I wished he still played for us as opposed to Song

 

It goes w/o saying we'd be better with Keita than Song at this point; we'd be better with Yaya than Masch too; we'd probably still be better (and much wealthier) with Eto'o than ever shelling out for Ibra and then Villa. But all 3 of those players, in different ways, wanted to play more and get paid more, and we're rolling with Song, Masch, and Villa now.

In Keita's case it was not only the limited PT (with Cesc and Thiago taking many of his old minutes) and the departure of Pep, but also the phase out of the Beckham-tax-relief in Spain after X years. Keita had been in Spain for too long between Sevilla and Barca to be eligible for the tax relief and tax on his Barca wages was set to skyrocket - making the move to China much more lucrative than anything Barca could match.

Also, in Song's defense, Keita himself was never comfy playing defense so maybe it was a stretch to expect Song to be able to do both. Finally Keita himself (much like Cesc) said it took over a year to learn the nuance of playing midfield at Barca, and suggested it was much easier for his team-mate (from Sevilla to Barca) Adriano to adjust.

 

Barcelona have scored 168 goals in the year 2012 so far #fcblive Club record in one calendar year: 170 in the year 2011 [via marca]

I know the club is on a record points total / victory total for the start of the league. Any other club records right at the moment?

Leo is looking towards all time leading scorer in Liga (Zarra at 251 Leo at 192), all time leading scorer for Barca (including friendlies - the Alcantara record of around 357, not sure of Leo's as it is hard to track friendlies though I think it was about 15 more to his 285 in official matches), all time leading CL scorer (Raul 71 - Messi at 56). Messi has also won 4 straight CL scoring titles (Gerd won 4 too, but not in a row). He has also scored multiple goals in 5 straight Liga matches (all braces), still curious what the record there is.

 

I don't think we'd be better off keeping Yaya, Keita, and Eto'o over Mascherano, Song, and Villa at this point in time. Our squad is very solid right now and when it's at a strength. Maybe we lack a quality third central defender and a regular goalscorer apart from Messi but they're not big issues right now.

As for the records, Messi has 305 goals for Barca - 65 away from becoming all time top scorer for the club. He needs 60 more goals to become all time Liga top scorer, 16 to become all time CL top scorer and 21 to become all time European competition goalscorer, and I believe the record for consecutive games scored in La Liga is 9 or 11, I'm not entirely sure. Not sure about the club records out there we can break with our league start, but Shakhtar have won 17 out of 18 league games this season in Ukraine.

 

All of those scoring records are attainable within the next two seasons (maybe three for the CL)

 

Third game in a row that Fontas doesn't play any minutes for Mallorca, this time he didn't even get a spot on the bench.

Starting to look like he almost surely doesn't have a future with Barca then.

 

That's kinda sad, but then again just how it is. It's a good situation that we produce more league level players than our squad can is able to include. And obviously the young Barca players know that the professional career most likely takes place outside of Barcelona.

Fontas is a good player though, and who knows what will happen to him. But after the loan, and Bartra playing ok, it was always going to be tough for Fontas.

 

fixed it for ya

 

To be fair Fontas wasn't on the bench due to injury.