CHAPTER 212: Basel (0) - Barcelona (5) [analysis

Alternative Title: Cantera Power

Positives

• A win obtained. That’s 3 more points added to the points tally.

• The team obtained another away win. It’s a good win as well considering that the team scored 5 goals.
• With the victory against Basel, that now makes Barça having maximum points from 3 wins out of 3 games.
• No goals were conceded. A clean sheet kept.
• And thus the winning streak continues. It’s the 8th straight win altogether.
• This win would serve as a big confidence and morale booster. This stems from Barça scoring 5 goals (another big win) and also another big positive point is that know Barcelona is the only team in the Champions League that has maximum points.
• All goals scored were from great finishing by the goals scores.
• Another excellent game by Barcelona. Fast tempo and pressuring the Basel defence, and the usual domination of controlling the ball possession and passes.
• Achieving the victory was vital (as it brings Barça closer to qualifying for the knockout stages) but as the game was won what can be said is that the biggest positive point from this game must be the fact that this was a game won by Barcelona’s youth players. 5 goals scored by players brought out in La Masia, and four of those five goals were assisted by these youth players themselves.
• Bojan’s breakthrough. Finally scores, and he got two goals to his tally from this game (could’ve have gotten a hatrick). The 2nd goal scored was very good, with a fantastic run with two Basel players chasing him down, and Bojan ended with a superb finishing. This must be very good for Bojan’s confidence. His joy is evident from the way he celebrated his goals.
• A good outing from Sergio Busquets as well (the revelation this season). Scored his first goal, and made that excellent assist for Bojan’s second goal.
• Alves gave that fantastic assist for the frist goal. His looking the other way as he lob the ball in the penalty area for Messi to collect and then going on to score the first goal was fantastic. That looks like the best assist so far this season from Barcelona’s gameplay. The Alves-Messi combo is really looking special.
• A very good characteristic is that Barcelona is scoring quick goals and that sentences their opposition quickly.
• On a different note, the Basel crowd was great.

Negatives

• Even though Barcelona won the game comfortably and dominated, Basel had made some chances to score. If they were on par and same quality as Barça perhaps the scoreline would have been some different.
• Bojan was a bit unlucky with that goal he scored deemed offside. If he can time his runs better he would be scoring more goals in the future (an aspect fro improvement though).
• Another good scoring opportunity missed by Bojan was in the second half where he had chipped the ball but unfortunately the ball was just a little bit to high above the crossbar. He had already made great dribbling and had good control on the ball as he tried to move in. It was just too bad though.