Mike Tyson used to say that everyone has a plan until the first punch. Madrid hit first and hit twice. And Barça, who spent the previous one announcing that they were going to be brave, came out scared for two thirds of the match. If football is a game of mistakes, Ancelotti’s team made none and Xavi’s made them all. Crime and Punishment.
Barça offered its flattest, most predictable and contemplative face, laid the red carpet for Madrid and the whites, empowered by their intensity and their cons, pummeled Barça’s defensive fragility. There is no big party that does not decide the forcefulness. Madrid had it and Barça did not. Xavi’s flight crashed at the Bernabéu – just where it was said that he had obtained his doctorate with that vaunted 0-4 -, and the remains of the accident appeared in the ‘black box’: his team did not win duels, they pressed badly, they defended worse and far from being rebellious, they went into the break turning the other cheek. Bleeding from the sides, Vinicius and Valverde dispatched Roberto and Balde with an insulting superiority, while Carvajal and Mendy stopped Dembélé and Raphinha. The rest was taken care of by Toni Kroos, who became the master of the court in the center. Madrid knew what they were playing for and Barça did not.
If it was a classic to redeem himself from failure in the Champions League, if the Bernabéu was the best day to get up, during the first half it was the worst day to get out of bed. If good coaches are the ones who enhance the virtues of their players and hide their defects, Ancelotti enhanced the virtues of his players and Xavi exposed the defects of his. Orphan of personality, like against Bayern and Inter, Barça once again showed that they have a jaw of glass. As the minutes went by, Xavi took his leg out of the place where he had put it and shook the cocktail shaker. He put claw (Gavi), verticality (Ferran) and goal (Ansu) in the field. Surprise, the match turned. Ansu stirred up the hornet’s nest and Ferran sowed doubt at the Bernabéu.
The culé dream vanished when Rodrygo, from a penalty after a VAR review, settled the lawsuit. Barça, which is still under construction and gave away the first half, woke up too late and was left without a lead. And Xavi, who always talks about being brave, will have to reflect on why his team went to the Bernabéu with fear and above all, why the rebellion was left on the bench. If the week was to measure the current football stature of Barça, the team has not measured up. Tyson was right: everyone has a plan… until he receives the first punch. They have given Barça two, in the Champions League and in the League. And both times, he has ended up visiting the dream room.