By a Score of 4-0, the Torch Passes to Bayern Munich
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Version 0 of 1. LONDON — Perhaps before we ask whether we are witnessing the end of Barcelona’s magnificent era, and the rise in its place of a powerful Bayern Munich, we should get one thing straight: It was lunacy for Barça to expect to take on a superbly fit and supremely confident German champion in its own backyard with ten and a half fit players. The Catalan side did exactly that by allowing Lionel Messi to attempt to play the full 90 minutes at the Allianz Arena in Munich. The best player in the world, Messi might be. But even he is human, and to ask, or allow, Messi to go into this pitched battle after he had managed just two workouts after damaging his right hamstring three weeks ago? That was the height of folly. He was on the field, but he never raised his pace to a gallop. And when it was done, after Bayern had munched Barça to the tune of four goals to nothing, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, the home team’s chairman, delivered the verdict. “Beating Barcelona 4-0 is a dream,” said Rummenigge, who was himself once a fine, fine forward. “Thomas Müller had a fantastic match, but do I think that makes him the best in the world? Messi is still No.1, though I don’t think he was completely fit tonight.” Not completely, and not even close to physical readiness for this type of contest. The Bayern players hustled and hounded him from the start, just as they surrounded Xavi and Andrés Iniesta, ensuring that the famed Barça playmaking trio had no space to turn, no place to hide. And Munich’s team was extraordinary at that. Its players, from the forwards to the backs, maintained such a high intensity, such a suffocating tourniquet on space, that very few sides in this or any other competition would find a rhythm. In the words of Arjen Robben, the Dutch winger for Bayern who is not usually associated with the terms “relentless high energy” or “defending from the front”: “We can be very proud. We fought for every meter, we didn’t give them any space to play, I would say that’s quite impressive.” Extremely so. On turf that had been excessively watered so that it was difficult for either side to pass and move as both can, it was always the home players who ran the extra meter, who held arguably the best attacking team of modern times in a vicelike grip, and who broke to score four times. Munich preyed on Barcelona’s known weaknesses in defense. The first two goals came after set-pieces and in the air, where the Catalans were down to one experienced center back, Gerard Piqué. And he, with his newly shaven and exposed scalp, is not rock-solid at the best of times. First Dante — Munich’s big Brazilian, who goes to the opposite extreme of Piqué with a dark mop of hair — outjumped his countryman, Dani Alves, allowing Müller to finish off the chance with a downward nod of his head. Then Robben floated the ball into that same vulnerable spot of Barcelona’s defense, and when Müller provided the header, Mario Gómez was on the goal line to poach goal No.2. He was a fraction offside, possibly, but the Hungarian officials did not see that infringement. And we were seeing next to nothing of Messi, and precious little of the way that Barcelona, as a whole, normally hunts the ball down to impose its tiki-taka style. It had no time, no apparent inclination and also no ideas coming from the bench. It seems strange that Barça is winning the Spanish league, so far ahead even of Real Madrid, yet there is this definite diminution of the intensity that served the team in the first three years that Pep Guardiola coached the team. In truth, it was because Guardiola felt that he was no longer able to inspire that urgency that he stepped down last summer — stepped down so he could take a sabbatical, and now he is about to return to a fresh challenge, as the coach of Bayern Munich. The outgoing Munich coach, Jupp Heynckes, has unfinished business. Since the announcement was made in January that Guardiola would replace him in June, Heynckes’s team has won all but one of 20 games in all competitions. It is as if Heynckes’s annoyance at the way he is being replaced is stoking up the team to a remorseless chase for all the prizes. Guardiola’s No.2 at Barcelona, Tito Vilanova, has come through a traumatic winter during which he underwent surgery for cancer of the parotid gland. That gives him some immunity from criticism, but why he chose not to change the lineup — and specifically not to take off Messi, whose struggle was plain and painful to watch — only he knows. As it was, Munich turned its supremacy into a complete rout. Robben scored the third goal (albeit with the aid of a blatant, uncensored, body check by Müller on Jordi Alba to create the space). And Müller finally stretched out to prod the fourth, devastating goal against Barça. “They gave us a thrashing,” admitted Piqué. “There’s no excuse, no point in talking about the referee.” And, while Barcelona in March came back from losing the first leg against A.C. Milan to win, 4-0, in the second leg, this will not happen again. Xavi, for one, concedes that Bayern was better, and stronger, in every aspect Tuesday. Moreover, even if Messi is fully fit and on fire next Wednesday, the Germans know that they are physically — and perhaps crucially — the masters now. Barcelona’s team is, sadly, on the way down. It will see out the season as champion in La Liga, but a squad that was troubled in Europe by Celtic, Milan and Paris Saint-Germain was forlorn and waiting for the final whistle in Munich. We should say, now, thanks for the memories guys. This has been a memorable, mesmerizing period of all that is good in the sport. There is talk of Neymar, the young Brazilian, joining Messi in attack this summer but, unless he knows more about defense than is likely, the real need for fresh legs and minds is at the back. Bayern is the force now. |