Manchester United vs Barcelona - The Facebook Analysis

K’homotho Mokhojane – based in Port Elizabeth, South Africa – is an ardent Manchester United supporter, so much so that he isn’t averse to posting a ten-page Facebook update first thing in the morning about his beloved Red Devils. Most of the time he doesn’t make the slightest sense, rambling on with poems about how Sir Alex is the greatest manager ever to live or how Nani should be the world footballer of the year… this one though is a peach, a little sneak peak at United’s biggest match of the century…

Uefa Champions League Final, The United viewpoint
By K’homotho Mokhojane

Let’s be realistic, we can’t compete with Barcelona when it comes to possession and controlling the game, no one can. Barca are a decade ahead of our time, like Total Football was when it was introduced in the 70’s, like the Italian man-to-man marking system in the 80’s and like the introduction of the 4-4-2 formation in the early 90’s.

The most important thing we must do is to look for weaknesses in Barcelona’s system and try to exploit them. Madrid proved to us that Barca can be beaten; they did it in the Copa Del Rey final and in the process set a template of how to beat Barca. Like Madrid we can sit back, defend and try to catch them on the counterattack.

Madrid used this tactic well in the Copa Del Rey final but in some ways Jose Mourinho’s team was lucky because they don’t have the type of players that can make this tactic successful – their only fast breaker is Cristiano. This was shown in the first leg of the sides Champions League semi-final at the Bernabeu where Madrid did a good job of containment but didn’t have the required explosion to break out and create danger at the other end.

In short, Madrid had the perfect plan for Barca but the type of players Jose chose were not suitable to effectively pull it off; guys like Marcelo for example are not effective in that system.

With United we have defenders and midfielders that can keep it tight and wingers that can cause problems for Barca, be it Park, Valencia or Nani. The physical attributes of our players, they are bigger and faster, are also an advantage Madrid didn’t necessarily have.

Another key point is Barca’s lighting quick front line of Messi and Villa. I believe we have to press them up field as much as possible, even when they have possession. We must not give Barcelona an invitation to attack by letting them keep the ball, we need to fight for every possible ball without getting unnecessary cards because this is Barcelona after all, eventually they will score if they have the ball for too long.

Tactics

In the 2007-2008 Champions League semi-final between Barca and United, we beat them 1-0 over two legs and went on to be crowned European champions. There were many reasons for that. Keep in mind they still had more or less the same team, except Pique (who replaced Marquez) and Villa (who replaced Eto’o)... but they still had Messi, Xavi and Iniesta. One of the main reasons was the positioning of Messi on the right of the Barca attack. Evra could surprisingly match Messi for pace so he kept him fairly quiet.

Fast forward to the Champions League Rome final in 2009, we were fatigued and we got our tactics wrong. Frank Rijkaard was gone and the new boy Pep got his tactics spot on by switching Messi from the right. Messi tormented Josh O’Shea and terrorised the centre of United's defence all game.

In midfield we had Anderson in for the suspended Fletcher, who could do a much better job than the Brazilian at tracking runners, getting stuck in with a tackle and winning back the ball. Rooney meanwhile was stuck out on the wing chasing shadows the entire game while Ronaldo, who was our lone striker, was stranded all alone in no mans land. And when Sir Alex brought in Berbatov for Paul Scholes I knew the game was lost. Berbatov only touched the ball twice in 15 minutes and Messi scored.

This year I believe Barca are an even more dangerous side than the 2009 version so we need to get our tactics spot on. This is the starting team that I would pick for the final…

1. Goalkeeper - Van der Sar

2. Rightback - Rafael (possible sub O’Shea)

3. Leftback - Evra

4. Centreback - Vidic ©

5. Centreback - Ferdy

6. Defensive midfield - Fletcher

6. Central midfield - Scholes (possible sub Giggs)

7. Right midfield - Valencia

8. Left midfield - Park (possible sub Nani)

10. Central attacking midfield - Rooney

11. Striker - Hernandez (possible sub Berbatov)

      Starting XI   

   Van der Sar

 Rafael     Vidic ©   Ferdinand    Evra

      Fletcher   Scholes

Valencia         Rooney           Park

     Hernandez

As you can see, I have four defenders. I choose Rafael over O’Shea because of the tenacity and speed he has. Barca does not represent any aerial threat so Rafael will do... and by the way he’s the first kid I saw that both Ribery and Robben couldn’t leave for dead with pace. With Evra I saw first hand that Messi can’t go past him, so the Argentine wonderboy might come to the right to try out Rafael. That could be interesting.

The midfield is actually a five-man unit, as you can see I have put Rooney as a central attacking midfielder. Remember the game-plan is containment then quickly launch lethal counterattacks – Rooney is deadly when running from deep, just ask Arsenal that...

I have put Valencia and Park as our wingers because of their pace going forward. I am the biggest Nani fan out there, but in this game he shouldn’t start because Park can carry out defensive duties way better than him. Park is a machine when going forward and tracking back, though he does tend to run out of steam in the second half. In this situation Nani can come in to exploit Barca’s tired fullbacks with his skill, pace and trickery.

Scholes can’t do any marking but his passing when breaking forward will be crucial. However because his engine is unlikely to last for the entire game I have put Ryan Giggs as a possible sub to bring calmness and experience. Scholes will just never know how to tackle but we can’t afford to have him and Giggs on the pitch at the same time.

I have one out-and-out striker, who is Hernandez and not Berbatov, starting the game. Chicharito is perfect for our game-plan because he is mobile and can run into spaces when being released. If we score first and we want someone to hold the ball and feed on-rushing runners then Dimitar is the man, but with Barcelona I think it is wise to use Hernandez.