Their tactic is generally let their creative players create something and I guess their creative players all reside in the centre of the field so it was all about getting a through ball through in and around the box. Even when they went wide it seemed to only be to try to stretch the game a bit and the instruction of the wide players seemed to be to then give it back to Xavi and co so that they could possibly do something with that extra space. If a through ball on the deck didn't get through then they tried the dinked/chipped pass a lot which would have been so easy for the defenders as it would have been in front of them and never got them turning towards their own goal.
I dunno, maybe stick Messi out wide and tell him and the winger on the other side to really stretch the play and get at the fullback? God knows they have the ability. Maybe float some crosses into the centre rather than drilled, middle to low crosses just to see if they can get Cech off his line a bit? Maybe take some long shots just to give them a bit more to think about because Messi was the only one willing to have a go from a distance and hence a couple of people on him all the time. Maybe having Iniesta or Xavi or Sanchez have a shot may have just been something a bit different?
I don't why but this came to mind when reading the above.
"The other point, surely, is that at least some of the options players need in the attacking phase must be forwards. Both Barcelona against Chelsea and Spain against Italy experienced a number of instances when a player received the ball 30 yards from goal and had only sideways or backwards passes available; what is needed then is players to make runs from deeper to burst beyond the line of the ball. That's precisely how Cesc Fábregas won the penalty against Chelsea and precisely how he scored his goal against Italy.
The introduction of Fernando Torres, meanwhile, while it might not have done much for Spain's harmony, certainly disrupted Italy, not least because it made Daniele De Rossi attempt to defend.
There's an irony there, of course, that it may be better for a proactive side to introduce a player that disrupts its own harmony because of the greater disruption he causes to the harmony of a reactive opponent."
Barca as great as they are or should I say the brand of football they look to play means that the whole team must be working as one, in harmony together for it to work. The problem with that your opponents NOT being in harmony together is just as important and in some situations even more important.
