Messi Looping Athletic's win: "It's a very special Cup for me"
Opinion Marcelino is eaten by lions, by Julián Ruiz
Cup Intense day of football (and table football) for King Felipe VI and Pedro Sánchez
Direct Narration and statistics
Barcelona enjoyed a spectacular night like never before against Athletic who has made torment a way of life.
He conquered the King's Cup playing like the angels to the beat of Frenkie de Jong, a superlative footballer, and seeing Leo
Messi
smile
, denying everyone who ventured a twilight that is not such.
Koeman was stunned by a work that few believed in, but which will continue.
All the goals that did not fall in the first half were piled up in the second before the extreme frustration of the people of Bilbao, defeated for the sixth time in a row in a final and who will continue to see how this tournament, more than an engine of illusion, is a colt of torture.
They haven't raised the Cup for 37 years.
Barça in Seville was blues and it was flamenco.
Barça lived to continue living.
Nothing attracts more than the things that we are unable to understand. We can already spend our lives trying to decipher football that there will always be a game that returns you in a bad way to the starting line. For example, that first half in which Barcelona kept the ball (83% possession), came out whistling from the pressure, coherently occupied the spaces and made some rivals run who seemed only waiting to find a way out to the slaughterhouse . And here the blessed incoherence of all this. None of that works if there is no lucidity in the determining areas. And Koeman's team only finished once between the three suits in that opening act. Athletic, it is true, not even that. Although a foul that only
Iñigo Martínez
went to finish off
in his heart he invited a certain prudence. Although that was nothing more than a simple mirage. An anecdote in a bathroom.
The first half hour of the Barcelona team had already scratched excellence.
Koeman
, who again denied 4-3-3 to trust his luck at 3-5-2, was right. He forced the limping Piqué. And despite the fact that
Araujo
spent the night warming up, Piqué won how many duels he had with Williams, who wandered through the final like a lost soul. In the wide area, the superiority of the Barça midfielders was more than evident. Either because
Busquets was
able to pitch the tent in the three-quarters zone, either because De Jong, metronome in hand, reached where no one did, or because Messi put his face on great occasions. He did not look at the ground, but at the sky. As much as he sent the referee to fry asparagus, with the cards sewn into his pocket.
The only problem in that initial act was the auction.
Dembélé
already showed that he is not a nine, so he stayed on the bench.
Neither is
Griezmann
.
What difference does it make.
He continues to be a footballer who one day won a World Cup, scoring even in the final.
It did not even affect him to have started the second half by missing a clamorous occasion.
When De Jong returned to leave him alone in the small area, his left foot did not play any more tricks on him.
Griezmann is persistent.
In both drama and glory.
Leo Messi celebrates one of his two goals against Athletic.Julio MunozEFE
De Jong Festival
Marcelino went from one place to another trying to correct the incorrigible. The Athletic coach, who always trusted in the benefits of living from routine, did not offer any reason for redemption. He chained himself to his 4-4-2. He made nine of the footballers who lost in the Cup final against Real Sociedad repeat ownership. He did not even give in to the temptation to bend the right side. Yuri's discomfort on the left bank allowed
Balenziaga
to play
, while the one who accompanied Dani García on the pivot was Unai López.
Muniain
was also enlisted. Although the body did not give him to play more than a time. When he began to exchange pieces and ideas, his players were nothing more than bones scattered on the grass. And Barça could already take them ahead.
De Jong
continued his festival by scoring the second with his head, a sublime prologue to Messi's nirvana. The Argentine dribbled and cut to leave his rivals nailed like stakes. When La Pulga turns his feet into brushes, it is difficult not to stay and admire the painting. He did not even neglect his alliance with Jordi Alba, who best understands his gaze. Unai Simón did not know where to look before the two goals that closed the exhibition. Griezmann was left without the fifth, canceled for offside. By then, Barcelona was already walking on confetti.
And that's a life, isn't it?
Some achievements and some disappointments.
Julian Barnes
must have been right.
The problem comes when disappointment hits you to the bone.
Poor Athletic.
Barça, on the other hand, senses a new time.
And the Cup was always a good starting point.
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