While not finding the spectacle of Barca's players play-acting particularly edifying in Champions' League 1st leg in Madrid, I seem to recall no football whatsoever taking place at the end of the Copa del Rey, once Madrid had (of course) gone in front. Minimal contact from Barca players was greeted by various Madrid players rolling around as if snipered. In fact Chelsea under Jose Mourinho when 1-0 up frequently saw Drogba more in the horizontal than the vertical come the endgame.
Perhaps the problem in Spain is Jose's team has rarely been leading 1-0 in big games going into the last 10 minutes and he rather misses being able to instruct Drogba etc to lie down & kill the game.
Thankfully Mourinho doesn't work for Barca any more as rather than witnessing the "spectacle" of parking the bus on going 1-0 up, we got Leo Messi's Maradona moment.
As in the world cup final, when the tactic of one team is simply to foul the other, the fouled team is of course going to exaggerate any contact. On a final note, Adebayor's "It's a man's game" comments made me laugh as in rugby (a man's game) the "totting-up" approach to niggly fouls would have seen most of the Madrid players in the bin for 10 minutes. And possibly deciding to play football instead of stopping football???While not finding the spectacle of Barca's players play-acting particularly edifying in Champions' League 1st leg in Madrid, I seem to recall no football whatsoever taking place at the end of the Copa del Rey, once Madrid had (of course) gone in front. Minimal contact from Barca players was greeted by various Madrid players rolling around as if snipered. In fact Chelsea under Jose Mourinho when 1-0 up frequently saw Drogba more in the horizontal than the vertical come the endgame.
Perhaps the problem in Spain is Jose's team has rarely been leading 1-0 in big games going into the last 10 minutes and he rather misses being able to instruct Drogba etc to lie down & kill the game.
Thankfully Mourinho doesn't work for Barca any more as rather than witnessing the "spectacle" of parking the bus on going 1-0 up, we got Leo Messi's Maradona moment.
As in the world cup final, when the tactic of one team is simply to foul the other, the fouled team is of course going to exaggerate any contact. On a final note, Adebayor's "It's a man's game" comments made me laugh as in rugby (a man's game) the "totting-up" approach to niggly fouls would have seen most of the Madrid players in the bin for 10 minutes. And possibly deciding to play football instead of stopping football???
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