Barcelona vs. http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Athletic-Club-c38535 – Spanish La Liga Review (Part 2)
Athletic Club came even closer to scoring an equalizer as the game continued in the Nou Camp. Not only did they resist the Barcelona strikers’ attempts to goal; they also came very close to scoring the next goal. During the 37th minute,
Athletic Club attacked on a relatively weak Barcelona defence line. Igor Gabildono was the one who found immense space on the left flank with Daniel Alves moving far up the right flank. The Bilbao winger gave an inch perfect cross towards http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Fernando-Llorente-c13671
who simply made no mistake to head it towards the target. However, Barcelona’s goal stopper Jose Manuel http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Manuel-c23383 Pinto was standing guard between the two
poles as Victor Valdes suffered from a knee injury during pre match training. Pinto might be seeing a lot of football for Barcelona as Valdes is expected to return after six weeks.
With the first half ending in the Nou Camp, Barcelona were leading the game by a single goal. It is true that the Catalan Giants had seventy two percent possession of the ball but Bilbao took their chances and tried to find an equalizer. The Athletic
Club’s coach Joaquin Caparros decided to pick a defensive team against Barcelona but with a goal coming as early as four minutes, he tried to play counter attacking football which eventually did pay off during the second half.
The second half started with Bilbao taking charge of the game. It took them only five minutes to finally make a breakthrough. The Barcelona left back Eric Abidal played a sloppy pass towards http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Sergio-Busquets-c33048 inside the 18 yard box. The Spanish youngster
had to make a run for it but Fernando Llorente reached it before him. Even though Sergio Busquets got the ball first, his sliding challenge caught Fernando Llorente and Athletic Club were awarded a penalty kick – an opportunity to get back into the game.
Fernando Llorente was sent to the sideline to receive treatment after the tackle so it had to be someone else to take the spot kick. http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Andoni-Iraola-c5593 was the one who took charge of the spot kick and stood over the ball as Jose Manuel Pinto stood on the
goal line to help his team stay in the game. Iraola looked nervous before the kick but sent Jose Manuel Pinto the wrong way and easily slotted the penalty kick to bring both the teams on level terms.
Barcelona started the game again and approached the game positively. Xavi Hernandez and Andres Iniesta were the two best players on the pitch as http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Lionel-Messi-c22296 looked to be slightly out of touch. The Argentinean often lost the ball for his side and with
Bilbao playing very close to each other it was hard for “Leo” to find the required space to do his mind blowing tricks. There were barely any opportunities created by Bilbao after their equalizer as they concentrated more towards getting a point from a difficult
away fixture as Barcelona organized themselves up front and tried to find the second goal. In case Barcelona drew the game against Bilbao, it would take them only three points above Real Madrid – a risk that they were not willing to take.
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