Yet to watch the match but sounds like Barca were just unstoppable, no shame in to losing to such an immense side so not sure why so many trolls have come out the cracks, they weren't here when United totally schooled Schalke.
I'm not a fan of any prem team but would have been nice for an English team to have won it, even if it would have meant Fergie winning the thing more than my Brian!
Sorry but thats not true, there is no shame in losing to the best team in the world, the scoreline is irrelevant, its the WAY you lose that is either embarassing or not. UTd weren't in it, they chickened out from playing their usual football as Fergie didn't have the guts to give it their all, they came up with a VERY poor plan B, practiced it for a week and lost badly.
You can lose 1-0, but have deserved to lose 8-0 and put in an embarassing performance, on another day you can put in a great performance and still lose 5-0. Utd put in a VERY poor performance.
AS for if Utd were sub par or Barca were too good, really Utd played a system that played to every strength of Barca, Utd played very badly and made it easy for Barca to play at their best. If UTd stopped passing so badly and actually defending properly then Barca wouldn't have looked nearly as good.
Its still not shameful or embarassing, but this wasn't a close game that Barca just snuck, Utd were never in it, it certainly wasn't a performance to be proud of. Well, Utd's best chance of a second goal being Pique's epically stupid backpass is a little shameful.
I think Arsenal and Utd could beat Barca, Real did it with a truly shocking defence making all the same mistakes, several others have beaten Barca with largely the same tactic, Inter did it, let Barca push the entire team forward, including defenders, and break on them hard, do it with EVERY single attack and Barca adjust, do it now and then, you get through and Barca make mistakes.
Its been the same tactic thats won most games against them for 4 years, yet people keep trying something "new" when the tactic to beat them is pretty well established, its pretty hilariously stupid to be honest.
Think about American football and trick plays, if you do one every play no one falls for it, if you play one tactic but randomly throw in a trick play they've got a decent chance of making it. Hernandez sitting upfront offside for 90% of the game looking for the same play was also known as the "captain obvious play", Barca adjusted and were ready from 8 mins in till the end.
I don't think it was intentional at all for Arsenal, but the substitutes and we moved from a completely non working system, and Barca playing their usual way, to suddenly having posession upfront, Barca had played normally for 60 mins and suddenly Arsenal were playing a completely different type and quality of football and we surprised Barca, got two goals while they weren't quite ready for it, then they got back to it and had us on the run at the end of the game. Asides from that 20min spell in the first leg, we were as outplayed as Utd were, the goals were completely inevitable, our general tactics were poor, our players made all the same mistakes, the only real difference was Barca's finishing was slightly off the boil against us.
Try the same thing all game long, everyones prepared for it all game long, epic fail, switch it up now and then, catch them not ready, get goals.
Inter showed it only last year, allow Barca forward, let them push the CB's right up, then every now and then rather than burn posession then make a break for goal and suddenly Barca look in real trouble.
