• Injury.Messi is replaced at rest
  • Narration: So we live the game
  • Classification: This is LaLiga

When Messi falls, the Camp Nou is silent. Silence is the anticipation of fear. The ball ceases to exist, and the eyes find no refuge other than the muscles of the Argentine, increasingly fragile. Barcelona, ​​who believed he had solved his game against Villarreal at dawn, stopped playing football in half an hour. He could only imitate the heavy walking of the Argentine, aware that the massage received in the band would be useless. He resisted standing a quarter of an hour, until the rest led to surrender. Barça simply resisted until De Jong hid the ball and Ansu Fati returned the lost smile. The triumph against Villarreal approaches the mood truce. [Narration and statistics: 2-1]

But there is no peace for Messi. Nor for Barcelona, ​​no matter how much its sparkling start and its appropriate end invited to think about the interruption of hostilities after the collapse in Granada. It was a beginning in which the Camp Nou salivated with the ownership of its new offensive trident. Luis Suarez squeaked, as if he were losing pieces and screws after each race. But Messi and Griezmann, away from the banks and with freedom to combine through the throat of the field, explored their coexistence.

The inaugural goal was born precisely in the association of the Argentine with the French. Hairs to the sea. Their relationship found the right photo opportunity. Messi threw the corner to the first post to see how Griezmann was rushing between Peña and Gerard Moreno. The ball came tense to the hole where it should. And the former Atlético striker was also showering with the comb, with no possible response for Asenjo.

Villarreal paid the blow. Disoriented, he didn't even worry about bothering Arthur when the seas opened. The distance was unassuming, Iborra must have thought when he decided not to go in search of his rival. But the Brazilian, although he was about 30 meters away from the goal, was found so liberated that he threw a hammer. The ball shot hard, but also very straight. Asenjo should not have expected the arrival of leather to his domain, because when he wanted to react the Catalans were already running to hug Arthur.

By then, Messi had already proposed to monopolize the party. He didn't even care that the center of the field, without De Jong's start, hardly built a game. The presence of Sergi Roberto in the right interior continued to lead to disorder. Messi was doing his thing. Emboldened one day after being crowned by FIFA in Milan, La Pulga faced whoever was needed. Not four players at once, organized in their harassment, were able to snatch the ball.

Until his light went out. Messi was advancing when nobody warned him that behind him Ontiveros was on him. Sergi Roberto took the fight, and the end of Villarreal, the boot. Messi's gesture was already twisted without remedy. And despite some attempt to rebel against his grief - he even tried some starts to make sure the stability of his fibers - he said enough at the break. A task for Barcelona. More and more behind. Increasingly stunned.

Even more after seeing how Cazorla, who has been half-life denying twilight, cut distances before the end of the first act. The Villarreal captain showed Camp Nou that his left booty piles up both art and the right. Ter Stegen was not able to decipher the trajectory of the ball, which only stopped rotating in the net.

The emergence of Ekambi in the second half, together with the awakening of Chukwueze in front of Junior Firpo, made a Barcelona tremble that only found answers in Dembélé's arreones. The end, in charge of supplying Messi and returning after an injured month, did not want to miss his chance. Although gasoline did not last long. Villarreal pressed, with Ter Stegen finally getting in the way of Cazorla, one step away from the draw.

He had to leave De Jong for Barcelona to change. To recover certain criteria. The exit of Luis Suarez, after another bad game, and the entrance of the teenager Ansu Fati finished solving the problem. The boy turned the stadium upside down again. He rounded the goal twice and claimed a penalty from Peña.

Valverde already knew with the triumph. But tranquility is impossible. The tide took Messi with him.

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  • football
  • First division
  • FC Barcelona
  • Villarreal CF

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