Pre-Match Preview: Barcelona – Tenerife

This is it. We are entering the last stretch of games (3 to be exact). After 15 points, we will find out who to crowned champion of the 2009/2010 La Liga is. Mathematically, there are only 2 teams who can win the title and those 2 are Barcelona and Real Madrid. After Real Madrid’s (lucky?) win over Osasuna last night, it became clear to me that not only do we have to work our butts off until the very end, but we also have no room for error come Tenerife, Sevilla and Valladolid. There is much at stake here and I’m not just talking about the title. Messi is on the brink of capturing his first ever Golden Boot and Pichichi. He has 29 goals in 32 League appearances, not to mention 42 goals in all competitions with 50 appearances. Victor Valdes is also on the brink of capturing his third Zamora trophy. I don’t see how Barcelona can concede 11 goals in the last 3 matches; therefore, I deem the Zamora race done and dusted. But now, for the matter at hand..

Preview:

We are sitting at the summit of La Liga with a record 90 points. No team has ever reached the 90 point margin in La Liga’s current format. Real Madrid hold the record for the most ever in every single format and that is a mere 2 points away; 92 points. Speaking of which, they are sitting in second place one point behind us. After their win against Osasuna in the dying minutes, we have no margin for error whatsoever. Seeing that Barcelona – Tenerife and Mallorca – Real Madrid are going to be played on the same day with the latter playing right after our match, this is a must win game. The first thoughts that come to mind are “oh they are a relegating team who are battling for survival” and “this should be an easy match” Well it should be, but merely on paper. Lets not forget that Tenerife have had some surprising results this season. The sides that we had trouble breaking down, such as Espanyol and Mallorca, were beaten by this “second-rate” team. Osasuna, Mallorca and Espanyol all lost to Tenerife, which is why we should take this game very seriously and go all out to get the three points.

We’re entering this game with an unbeaten run of 13 matches (in the league). We have proven to be very stubborn at home with 16W-1D-0L. We have 49GF and 10GA and have collected 49 points (Real Madrid have collected 51 points but with a game in hand at home) which says a lot about how we play our matches at home. On the other hand, Tenerife enter this game having won their last game against Racing. Away from home they are the worst side in the league. They have collected just 6 points (yes you heard right) from 17 matches. 1W-3D-13L with 13GF and 40GA. As I said before, this game is easy on paper, but that doesn’t mean that the three points are in the bag. Tenerife have never beaten us. Never, ever! They have never got a point from us. Barcelona have amassed 5 wins from 5 matches against Tenerife and scored 11 in the last two matches alone! We all recall The Messi show last match in which he bagged a hat-trick, but whats more interesting is that the previous match played against Tenerife ended  0 – 6 with Kluivert scoring 4 goals. I’m sensing a trend..

Iniesta is still out injured, while Abidal has been training. Xavi, on the other hand, is filling my heart with warmth. Even though he is injured and even though he might miss the world cup, he is giving his all for Barcelona in these last three games. That’s what’s great about being a Barcelona fan, we don’t have to wave white handkerchief from the stands (cough, Madrid, cough) because we simply don’t need to. Out of the Champions league? No problem.  The team is united and so are the fans and that is the key to a successful team. Bojan has won me over. I would like to see him in every starting lineup as a CF. I’m not saying that I don’t want Ibrahimovic playing. I do, because at his best he can be devastating, but I don’t want to see him in the CF role because of his pace. When Guardiola injected him into the match against Villareal, he allowed him to play on the right flank of the midfield. His strength and trickery confused the other players. Who knows, Barcelona do have a knack for making strikers-cum-midfielders (Guddy). Busi is suspended for this game.

Predicted Lineup: Valdes, Alves, Puyol, Pique, Maxwell, Toure, Keita, Xavi, Messi, Pedro, Bojan.

Fatigue is only in the mind. Yes we played a match on Saturday and have another match to play on Tuesday. We are used to this because over the course of two years, we have had non-stop games in all competitions over the weeks and therefore fatigue is no excuse. Expect Tenerife to get a little ballsy at the beginning and our defense has to be up for the task. We were lucky against Villareal and should learn from the mistakes we did. Our focus should be only on this match and not on the tricky tie against Sevilla, nor on the Mallorca – Real Madrid match.

We are playing at home and should have the backing of all the cules.

Prediction: Barcelona 4 – 0 Tenerife.

Visca el Barca!!