This Super Cup deserves a barge, although the pandemic recommends that it be with the people who make Calle Licenciado Poza, the old path of San Mamés, a place with an atmosphere that does not seem from this time, in which Athletic survives clinging to an idea that football merchants turn into a utopia: belonging.
It is well, then, that the football of the
Messi
, expelled for his impotence, and the
Florentinos
, where the glare of money and stars overshadows everything else, they are reminded where a team begins.
The principle of belonging is for everyone, also for Barça or Madrid who have stayed on the road, because no hobby is better than another, but Athletic has sublimated it with an idea that makes it unique, for good and for bad, to be proud and to suffer.
It is day of the first.
Athletic repeats the title won in 2015 and against the same rival, then led by
Luis Enrique
.
It was the Barça of the triplet, nothing less.
The format, on this occasion, increases the merits, since it has defeated the two greats in the Super Cup four.
In the final, after tracing two goals from
Griezmann
, far from being able to fulfill his exorcism, thanks to
De Marcos
and
Villalibre
, and dominate a speculative Barça to knock him down in a big way in extra time, with a cross and lethal shot from
Iñaki Williams
.
Marcelino
could not start in better shape, waiting for the pending Cup final, against Real Sociedad.
The team's understanding of the coach's new encouragement is undoubted, but it would be unfair not to recognize, as the Spaniard has done, the merits of
Gaizka Garitano's
stage
.
Marcelino has been like a punch on the nervous system of the team to reactivate the constants that are in his idiosyncrasy.
Athletic, to begin with, is intense.
We will see the rest later.
The choice of Barcelona
Barcelona, on the other hand, was nothing of what it has been.
He started with Messi, absent against Real, but he started more aware of his own fears than of his reference.
It was a Barça that speculated, instead of a Barça that played.
An unknown land for the Catalans.
Koeman's watchword was to avoid the mistakes that have penalized his team so much since his arrival.
They have been waterways.
In San Mamés, against the same team, he had one that cost him a bit from Williams, right after he started, but it was when he started playing when he knocked down his opponent and offered one of the best passages of this strange season, for everyone but especially for Barcelona fans.
Where to start was the question.
He chose defense.
The consequence was to disconnect from his attack, from Messi, far from his best version,
Griezmann
and
Dembélé
.
The high, very high pressure of Athletic took the game, then, to a single field, the vicinity of
Ter Stegen
.
As he faced Madrid, Marcelino looked for the error near the goal, but Barça did not offer it, despite the doubts of
Lenglet
, who saw an unnecessary card too soon.
At his side grows a hierarchical and unexpected central.
It's
Araujo
.
There is wood in the footballer.
The question is whether it will forge in times of storms in Barcelona.
It is more difficult but it is an opportunity.
Marcelino was in control and Koeman, security.
But the reality is that none of it served.
If anything, Athletic, who kept the most dangerous men away from the erogenous zone of their land.
That is already a world compared to Messi and co.
The problem is that he did not enjoy the spaces through which Williams advances like a cat through the Serengeti.
It was a compact Athletic, advanced in its lines but not very hurtful.
Just a
Layer
release
for minutes of mastery.
Unai Simón
was looking at everything as if hunting for beasts with binoculars.
None came close.
Giving up so much is too much for Barça, because it is not a team made for what it did in Seville.
The reason is that his way of defending is not his best suit, it is not Atlético, he is not made to resist even if it is not against a highly armed team.
One proof is how quickly his capital lost, just minutes after Griezmann's goal, in the only Barça choral action.
Neither
Dest
, nor Jordi Alba covered the center or the entrance of opponents and De Marcos appeared before Ter Stegen to leave everything as at the beginning, but with an inflamed Athletic.
Raúl García was
able to overtake Athletic, but the VAR saw what the eyes cannot see.
The centimeters, on the other hand, were on the side of Griezmann, who caught the shot in the place of nine.
Koeman's worst omens were fulfilled and Villalibre caught up with Barça's miseries with two minutes to go.
Extra time had an emotional winner, with Messi unknown and sent off.
Williams only put the signature to utopia, like a great blow to the estuary.
According to the criteria of The Trust Project
Know more
Spain Supercup
Ronald Koeman
Ter Stegen
Real society
Raul Garcia
Ousmane Dembélé
Madrid
Luis Enrique
Jordi Alba
sports
LaLiga Santander 2020 - 2021Marcelino, a volcano in San Mamés: from past 'whips' to the love-hate of the fans
Copa del Rey 2020 - 2021 Copa del Rey draw: Alcoyano - Real Madrid and Cornellà - Barcelona
FootballThe anger of Bartomeu, the dismissal of Valverde and the day that Barcelona began its decomposition process
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The final of the Super Cup, live: Barcelona - Athletic