Barcelona 2-3 Valencia: Valencia rewarded for bravery on the counter-attack
The starting line-ups
Barcelona suffered their first home defeat of the season, to a Valencia side who had the third-worst away record in La Liga.
Tata Martino rested Andres Iniesta, and is still without Neymar.
Valencia had a busy few days in the transfer window – mainly with players departing. Helder Postiga, Ever Banega and Andres Guardado have all left the club. Juan Antonio Pizzi selected a cautious XI with five players across midfield, including two holding midfielders, while Jonas was only on the bench.
This was a peculiar game. Barcelona were utterly dominant for the first 40 minutes, with little sign Valencia were set to record an upset. This wasn't exactly a masterclass from Pizzi, but elements of Valencia's play – and particularly their bravery in getting men forward on the break – should be applauded.
Messi dominates
There was little unusual about Barcelona's strategy – it was a standard 4-3-3 with familiar players in familiar roles. Sergio Busquets appeared to play a little higher than usual, and Cesc Fabregas was very much tucked into a midfield three, rather than his roaming attacking role where he plays closer to Messi. Pedro Rodriguez stretched the play on the left, Alexis Sanchez tried to break in behind the defence more frequently from the right.
The key player was Messi, though – he was at his most dominant, although not necessarily at his best. The statistics underline his influence – he had eight shots (no-one else had more than three) and created six chances – which means he was involved in 14 of Barca's 20 attempts. He also dribbled past opponents nine times (no-one else did so more than once). This was Messidependencia at its most blatant – although that's inevitably only cast as a negative depending upon the scoreline.
Messi was actually disappointing in front of goal, and had a glorious late chance to equalise saved, following a brilliant passing move with Iniesta and Daniel Alves. Although he's registered in the Copa del Rey and managed a penalty here, he hasn't scored from open play in his last nine league appearances (during some of these, he's been hampered by injury).
Clearly, he's still Barcelona's best and most important player, but Messi at his peak could have scored a hattrick, which would have rendered Valencia's efforts futile.
Valencia defensive shape
Valencia started with a reasonably high defensive line, nearly being caught out by runs in behind from both Sanchez and Alves in the opening 25 minutes. Despite this bravery, they didn't press particularly high up and concentrated on minimising the space between the lines. Both Fabregas and Xavi stayed deeper and enjoyed their freedom in midfield positions, with Messi often the only one attempting to find pockets of space between Valencia's midfield and
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