In a way, I’m glad that it was neither a pasillo nor the alirón at the Camp Nou on Saturday night, because then a victory like the one we got would have meant nothing. And I’m glad this game had a clear winner, that there were no controversies over refereeing decisions, no fighting, no fury, no angry words, just football. And that just 27 percent possession is enough for a win!
Madrid now needs just six points in its next four games to win the 2011-12 Liga without depending on anyone else. Madrid could become champions this weekend if we beat Sevilla and Barcelona loses to Rayo Vallecano, since the difference will be stretched to 10 points, and there will only be nine points left to play. If that happens, it will be interesting to see what happens with the pasillo at San Mamés, especially since the fans and club don’t have very warm feelings towards Madrid after the whole Copa del Rey final site issue.
FIVE. Let’s start with several gif-able moments from the game.
(Look who’s together again.)
SIX. The goals.
Sami had the honor of scoring the record-breaking 108th goal of the current campaign, by shooting the ball into the goal through the legs of Carles Puyol. This set a new record for most goals in a Liga season. And we have four games left! The previous record was held by the 1989-90 Madrid team, with 107. The goal average is a stellar 3.2 goals per game.
And for those people claiming that Sami’s goal is offside, TV analysis (on like every single channel in Spain) shows that Adriano’s foot was aligned with Sami, making his position legal.
Cristiano’s goal was equally important, and I loved how he managed to dash the hopes of a Barça comeback almost immediately and silence the Camp Nou. He took the wind right out of their sails. Pep knew it.
If Cristiano scores against Mallorca (jornada 38), he’ll become the first footballer in the history of the Liga to score against all of the other teams in the league in one season.
Loved the little moments in the goal celebration between Cris and Calleti, and Pepe and Sergio!
SEVEN. What an ugly gesture from Dani Alves to Cristiano! It brought back memories Pepe stepping on Messi’s hand, only this time, the pro-Barcelona press remained quite silent, without their usual outrage, since of course it went against one of their players. There was also this little scene earlier in the game where Alves rejected Sergio’s offer to help him up. What poor sportsmanship. But I liked that Cris and Alves made up later, and so the situation didn’t get bigger.
EIGHT. And I’m happy that both our fullbacks had excellent games, with Coentrão shutting down Alves and Arbeloa doing the same to Tello. I have to add that I’m especially happy for Fábio following all the criticism he received after the game against Bayern Munich.
NINE. Cheers to the rain for making the shirts transparent and cling to the players…
… and for giving us pictures like these. Hopefully no one got sick though!
TEN. Pep Guardiola is known for his irony, and I think it’s maybe rubbed off on those around him. Prior to the game, we had Barcelona fans taunting Cristiano Ronaldo with chants of “Messi, Messi,” which would have been made much more effective had those same people not been taking pictures of him with their cameras and mobile phones. They know they’re in the presence of a superstar. Then during the game, we had Thiago yelling at the Madrid players, “you all are spending the entire game on the ground!” At that moment, Sergio Busquets walked past him. Oh, the irony.
ELEVEN. The combined Xabi Alonso/Esteban Granero pose section, since Xabi makes a guest appearance in Esteban’s moment.
TWELVE. The Mou corner. At least he refrained from throwing that plastic bottle at the bench.
THIRTEEN. I don’t know if you noticed, but yesterday “lamamadadeXavi” was a trending topic on twitter. In English, that translates to “Xavi’s blow job.” This was the result of the unfortunate Sport cover (left) for today, which showed Xavi positioned in quite an awkward place, and with that sex ad right underneath! Shortly after, Sport changed their cover to the one on the right, using a slightly different picture and repositioning the sex ad. Jajaja!
FOURTEEN. I was originally going to start off the post with these two gifs, but I couldn’t resist making the one on the left part of the blog homepage (for now), so here they are.
