We are in danger of becoming boring Barca, but without the brilliance of Messi to call upon

Until someone finds a way to stop Barca and Spain winning trophies the way they play is fine.

I can think of a few teams of bygone eras who could feasibly roll this Barca side, but none in the current generation look capable. But I do think they're running out of gas. You can usually tell when Pep's Barca are out of puff, because their passing becomes staid and horizontal.

It's a testament to the phenomenal endurance and character of their midfield in particular that they can perform at that level week in, week out. Some attribute it to the lower intensity of La Liga but that can't explain the whole thing.

The fatigue injuries and indifferent performances of the likes of Fabregas give an idea of what happens when a less well oiled machine like ours tries to play a possession game for a whole season.

I guess when Xavi starts to slow down for good in a year or two, they'll come back to the field a bit. He's made 50+ appearances for Barcelona for the past four or five years.

They barely get out of first gear most weeks.

why would they bother to?

They wouldn't, just saying that is the reason for their "phenomenal endurance".

The wear and tear of the PL is obviously greater, but Cesc has only managed 35-ish appearances for several years now. That's 20 fewer than Xavi.

maureen has done it again . he is the bane of catalonia

he's sort of a one trick pony, but he understands that you don't beat barca by trying to outbarca them.

anyway, there's hardly a club in the world i hate more than barca atm (just spurs, really), so good result. hate all their players, hate the way they play, hate their smug plastics who think they're the guardians of pure football (applies to our plastics, too, actually)

Wish we had a single player in the NLD who worked as hard as Di Maria, Pepe, Ronaldo, Marcelo to name a few.

mourinho is an inspirational leader. the players give 100% percent for him. i was really impressed by the real madrid players in the last two matches against barcelona.

Pepe especially, he's been a beast infront of the Madrid defence.

Villa's really letting Barca down, as well as Abidal and Puyol's injuries. The whole team seems so tired, I'd assuming they'll be able to be at their best in the 2nd home leg, but if Madrid can take a lead there it'll be the same game as Inter last year + Ronaldo and Di Maria's counter attacking at the other end. I'd put Madrid as very slight favourites now but the games are set up perfectly for the neutrals!

Villa is going through the same kind of slump as Ibra. I suspect neither were fit enough for the Barca set-up, and have been worn down from being the main option at centre forward.

Villa hasn´t been played at CF all season. Messi has played centrally and Villa at LW.

As for Zlatan - he was fine, and scoring plenty, until Guardiola felt the need to try to rein in his natural movement. Idiotic IMO to buy a player like Zlatan and then want to use him in a static role in the box. Talk about waste of talent!

Interesting thing I noted: Pepe has seldom, if at all, played at CM for Real Madrid although he does so for Portugal. Özil is usually played centrally, but now at RW. Sergio Ramos most of the times plays at RB but was now deployed at CB. Ronaldo usually, at Real Madrid at least, plays on the wing but was now deployed at CF.

All these positional changes out of players´ comfort zones and yet they only gave away a fraction of the opportunities to Barcelona compared to what we did. Very impressive.

Most players are versatile enough to switch positions and perform well. Our problem lies in how players relate with each other. You will notice our offense is increasingly stagnant, very little off-the-ball movement, and effective one-two interplay. On defense, you will notice that there is very poor help-side defense and filling of passing lanes. If players can't master that in their primary roles, then it is even harder to do well in an alternative position.

What does Wenger do in practice?

Over £100m worth of talent will usually be able to play anywhere within their remit. Ronaldo is a striker whether he starts from the left, right or centrally. Ramos played central for 2-3 years and Ozil is just an attacking midfielder.

They aren't doing anything revolutionary.

I hear you Capi. Still impressive that a team with so many players playing in unfamiliar positions were able to perform that well against probably the best attacking team in the world.

Özil on the wing had to defend more than he probably ever has done before, and he did well. Di Maria, a mostly offensive player for me, put in an extremely impressive defensive performance, and so did Ronaldo when deployed on the wing late on.