Nobody can deny that the current Barcelona team is extremely special, with some top football writers hailing them as the best side that there has ever been as they dominate European football with their very own brand of patient, passing, beautiful football that has left coaches all around Europe scratching their heads and football fans around the World marvelling at their brilliance.
But will this season be any different? Firstly looking at the opposition that Barca will be facing domestically in La Liga there is a story that has become all too familiar. Realistically Real Madrid will again be the main, if not only team to be challenging for the title as has been the case for a long time now.
Between the two Spanish giants they have taken the last seven La Liga titles with Madrid claiming two and Barca taking five including the last three. Villareal were the last team other than these two to take the title back in the 2003-04 season and they came third last season but finished 21 points behind Real, so for arguments sake lets forget about the rest as such is the void now that it is highly unlikely that anybody will crash the party.
So this just leaves the tantalising question, who will go all the way next season: Barca or Madrid? Last season was a fascinating tussle that went all the way and ended with Pep Guardiola’s men pipping Mourinho to the post by just four points. On the face of it you could say not a lot has changed. Neither coach has been overly active in the transfer window and there has been plenty of speculation on both sides, with every want away superstar being linked with a move to one or the other.
Then there’s Barca’s seemingly never ending pursuit of Cesc Fabregas which could well go through but with the midfield already at the club, which keeps Fabregas on the bench for the Spanish national team, it would not make alot of difference apart from adding depth and giving Guardiola a headache when it comes to team selection. The other big transfer saga which involves both clubs is that of Brazilian wonderkid Neymar. Both coaches are rumoured to be interested and if he goes to either it could make a big impact on who wins the title.
More important however, I feel, is the fact that Jose ‘The Special One’ Mourinho is still at the helm at Real Madrid and now he has had a whole year to get a Madrid side that he inherited at a time when they were considered to be seriously under achieving, to mould them into one of the well organised machines that he has become famous for. We must not forget that two seasons ago Mourinho took a rather ordinary Inter Milan team and made them so efficient defensively that they won the Champions League beating Barcelona on the way.
So on to Europe, can Barca make it three Champions League trophies in four seasons? Again one of the main challengers will be Mr Mourinho’s merry men who will be a thorn in Guardiola’s side at every level all season. The other distinct threat will surely come from the English clubs in the competition but again we have to ask, what has changed?
nothing has changed, the former madreal coach was even better than mourihno because he was able to withstand the pressure of elclassico but mourihno was defeated with 5-0, this is not the first time real claims they are ready to challenge barca, the arrival of sanchez to pair with villa, pedro, thiago and the possible arrival of fabregas will have no equivalent after xavi, iniesta and messi has no rrival in the madreal starting x1. BARCA is the best.
Barca is still the best and we’re going to defend our trophy.
Barca will always dominate in every Season…
wil they dominate again??? more than likely!!
who else ??