Respect? Barcelona and Real Madrid served up a
quite unwatchable affair in the Champions League
Much as everybody
hated to admit it, for once Jose Mourinho had a point. Naturally,
it was buried under the obligatory narcissism and masked by the
stench of countless red herrings, but it was still in there
somewhere.
He said: ‘I don’t know if it
is the publicity they give UNICEF, I don’t know if it’s their
friends at UEFA, but Barca have managed to get all this power - and
no-one else has a chance.’
Seriously, how do Barcelona
get away with quite so much? Is everybody browbeaten into a polite
acquiescence to their antics because they have a children’s charity
on their shirts? Surely if it were that easy, the Catalans would
stick a dog collar on their new kit and have done with
it.
But there is no escaping the
fact Barcelona have a ‘holier than thou’ attitude that conveys to
the rest of football it really should genuflect when in their
presence. Oddly, UEFA seem happy to oblige.
Anything that drops from the
lips of Mourinho must automatically be treated with a degree of
suspicion, since he has cast too many stones at too many people on
too many occasions for his views to be accepted at face
value.
But he was trying, in his own
scattergun fashion, to point out how the game appears to have
bought into Barca’s own boast that they are ‘more than a football
club’ - and that the authorities seem loath to tackle their
excesses because of this.
Few would argue with the
assertion that Barca are the most talented team in the world, but
dare to point out they also rank among the game’s most accomplished
cheats and that is endorsed with considerably less
enthusiasm.
After the midweek Champions
League debacle, Mourinho neatly slotted into his customary role of
pouting pantomime villain bearing the brunt of worldwide criticism
as his counterpart, Pep Guardiola, polished his halo
nearby.
But Barcelona are not some
angelic collection of pure football aesthetes innocently tiptoeing
their way around the ‘enemy of football’.
They dive and feign injury
more than most, not just in overheated handbag-waving battles
against their Madrid rivals either, but in any game where their
rhythm is upset and their supremacy challenged.
At the Bernabeu, Pedro fell
over more often than a drunk stepping off a spinning merry-go-round
with an inner ear infection. Dani Alves spent so long rolling on
the turf he became the first player to be stretchered away with
third-degree grass burns.
Yes, the Madrid histrionics
were bad, but Barcelona’s were worse. I have never seen a team
pressure a referee as they do, not even Manchester United in their
confrontation with Andy D’Urso.
Barca attack the official
mob-handed, waving imaginary cards in his face and surrounding him
in an obvious attempt to intimidate again and again. Skipper Carles
Puyol is the arch proponent of this repulsive tactic, leading his
team-mates in a strategy that is as co-ordinated and rehearsed as
any set-piece.
Madrid soon had Pepe sent off,
a decision that tipped the balance of the game. Barcelona’s
substitute goalkeeper was also shown a red card for his part in a
mob brawl at half-time, yet that was lost in the pre-ordained
narrative for this encounter that had cast Barcelona as angels and
Madrid as evil trolls.
Or is it just that the
wondrous skill of Lionel Messi is supposed to excuse everything
else they do? It seems to be enough for most people, but it
shouldn’t be.
Career threatening....! The Catalan club have a habit
of feigning injury and doing all they can to get opposition sent
off
The ex-England striker
Michael Owen, a former Madrid player himself, said on Twitter
during the game: ‘You are watching modern-day football here. Two
teams so closely matched. Huge advantage to get an opponent sent
off. Pure gamesmanship.’
That’s how many regard it,
they say it is ‘gamesmanship’. Players such as Owen add the top
flight is about ‘pushing boundaries’. But the rest of us ignore the
euphemisms and call it what it really is — cheating.
Football is nothing if it
continues down this road. It will be reduced to the level of
pretend pillow fights. Contests have as little credibility as those
bogus American wrestling competitions where steroid-fed lumps of
mahogany pretend to grapple with one another.
Emergency: Dani Alves left the field on a stretcher
but returned at full pace within seconds
The prevailing
cynicism right now is actually quite abhorrent. I expect it from
Mourinho, but when the best collection of players on the planet
routinely fake, deceive and think nothing of the embarrassing
spectacle they are making of themselves and the sport, that
‘modern-day football’ Owen refers to has a serious
problem.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNgNy5IbwOc&feature=player_embedded
The other week, an Under 20
Chilean footballer called Bryan Carrasco actually grabbed the arm
of an Ecuador opponent, punched himself in the face with the other
player’s hand and won a free-kick.