• Direct Narration and statistics

In football there is no empirical formula. Vision, skill, strength and goal are combined in different doses as a way of leading to victory. Because enjoyment is born almost solely from her. The percentages of possession and pass records sweeten it, but nobody understands them if they camouflage themselves as a substitute for the goal.

Mestalla was asking loudly for a statement of intent to each team and the answer was from the first second. Barça de Quique Setién lives on the ball to bore the opponent. The eternal rondo born in Ter Stegen ... but dies before stepping on area. Busquets, De Jong and Arthur associated, touched and held the ball for up to six minutes in a row, but were not surprised. Neither Jordi Alba and nor Sergi Roberto. Griezmann looked for how to get into play, Ansu Fati the spaces where they could find him and Messi turned at times very gray.

Valencia, slightly grafted from the spirit of Celades , did not enter that fight. He was mentalized to crouch and not be caught in the shadow, to bloom just at the right time. Many minutes it cost him to touch a ball but few more to step on the area. Kondogbia , a marshal erected in the brain due to the absence of Parejo, took advantage of the parsimony of Blaugrana, stole, associated with Soler to open Gayà, who slipped into the area until Piqué stopped him on penalty. Valencia could not have achieved more performance at its minutes of possession, however Ter Stegen emerged to clear Maxi's shot.

Far from lying down in the misfortune of not knocking out the Barca team, Valencia insisted on the formula. With a defensive firmness very forgotten in other games, he looked for the pressure with which to short-circuit Barça and Ter Stegen had to reappear to catch a bad clearance from Piqué to Ferran center and then the rejection of a shot from Maxi to the crossbar that Gameiro hunted. Only the German fulfilled the task of holding zero on his marker.

They wanted to wake up the Catalans with the first shot on goal, from a direct foul by Messi. Nothing else. The possession had not protected him and, in addition, the domain was no longer so overwhelming. Setién changed the band to Griezmann and Ansu Fati. It didn't work out either. Not a single corner kick appeared in the statistics and the exploited was Ter Stegen, forced to make five more stops than in any game of the first round.

The passage through the locker room changed the script. Maxi took care of his mistakes and opened the scoring. The Blaugrana goal, clueless because he hit Jordi Alba, could not frustrate the Uruguayan again.

Messi's three plays

The jug of cold water had its effect on the benches: Setién sought the bite of Arturo Vidal and Celades more control in attack with Rodrigo . Barça felt good about who knows if the change or goal against. The truth is that he woke up to protect his leadership. He advanced lines and surrounded Valencia in the area, not based on rubbing ball but on occasions. He became more vertical and was entrusted to Messi. Three plays of the Argentine could put the tie that, now yes, began to hover around. It was going to cost the Valencianistas more to emerge seeking the counter and Jaume had to appear to deflect a direct foul that slipped into his goal.

The blaugrana effervescence was short-lived. 12 shots and only four between the three suits, poor baggage for a thick and gray leader in Mestalla before a resilient rival. Celades' team may have gaps, almost all in defense, but it has learned to sustain itself at decisive moments like those presented to it.

It was a matter of, without losing composure, waiting for the loss, looking for it and even provoking it, because this new Barça remains flat. And arrived. Maxi hunted a Ferran assist to extend a freehand advantage in every inch of the field. Without the Parejo compass, with the tempted Rodrigo on the starting bench and with a failed penalty, but resurrecting in each small death, Valencia closed a victory that resisted him for 13 years and leaves the League's lead in the air.

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