Well, this wednesday fcb was responsible for 50% of the heart attacks around the globe.
It was quite a good game against Celtic, really exciting to see how both teams kept up with the exigence of the match.
The second goal by Celtic goes into my “valdezada” category. That is a goal scored only when Valdez is goalkeeping. He’s good on average but sometimes he’s just a natural mystery.

I hope to be able to watch the second match, maybe I’ll be busy with some other things, but I’m sure it will be another good game since Celtic will be hoping to get all they can in Camp nou.

There again, I’m trying to fullfil the goal of this blog, hopefully I’ll be able to watch the games and comment on them thanks to rojadirecta.com.

This weekend, Barcelona went to kick Zaragoza’s ass, and they managed to do it, but not as easily as I thought. Zaragoza did a great game but this time Barcelona was luckier.

As for the two polemic plays (Henry’s goal and the 82′ penalty), honestly I don’t think it was a hand by Henry, for the penalty, I think it was a hand since the ball hits below the shoulder of the player.
But, let’s be reasonable, at such a rush, without or lazy asses commodity of watching the replay again and again, I think the referee decided correctly in both plays. Maybe for the second one we could blame the assistant for not being rigurous with his flag raising.

If you -like me- don’t have DirectTV or any source of soccer broadcasting, then you can get the game via rojadirecta’s forums, where you can grab a torrent (you need to sign up).

So after some ugly weeks of suffering, la Liga is finally over.

Sadly, Barsa was 30 minutes away from being champions again.

This tuesday, La Porta will be announcing plans for the new season. Rumor has it that besides Saviola, Edmílson, Giuly and Gudjohnsen will not be on the boat next season.

From the above, I would miss Giuly. But being realistic, he doesn’t have a chance to have minutes as long as Messi is not injured.

Let’s see how this turns out.

So if you are wondering what was the score or you want to see the entire match, you can download the video via bittorrent:

Here
or here

You will need something like yABC to download it (google for bittorrent client if you don’t have one).

Great match, Barsa showed why it’s the best club in the world.
3 goals in 7 minutes, that’s playing.

Here the videos of the goals (in cronological order).

• First goal by América and first goal by Barsa
• Second goal by América
• Third goal by América
• Own goal by Oleguer
• Time to kick some ass, 3 Barsa goals in 7 minutes

Barsa goals: Rafa, Saviola, Dinho (penalty), Eto’o
América goals: Cuevas (3), Oleguer (own goal)

Videos thank to Lluvia Blaugrana and YouTube.

Barsa started with:
Valdés, Belletti, Márquez, Puyol, Sylvinho; Van Bommel, Edmílson, Jordi Gómez; Giuly, Eto’o y Ezquerro.
This first videos cover the first time:

1st video
2nd video
3rd video
4th video

This are videos of the second time. Second and fourth videos are recommended, in the fourth you can find Barsa’s goal.

1st video
2nd video
3rd video
4th video
5th video
6th video

Videos found on Lluvia Blaugrana

You might be asking yourself why the heck there are no TV stations broadcasting the Barsa tour, well me too.

Between the facts I could gather, looks like Valdez saved the keep from a penalty kick (do you trust this guy? I’m still unsure), also sadly for the Tigres one of the mexican defenders scored an own goal.

Thanks god YouTube is here to help. Culés, the goals (wordpress.com doesn’t let me put the videos directly here, click the titles):

Ronaldinho’s goal (as seen on tv)

Ronaldinho’s goal (as seen on lucky cam)

Gudjohnsen’s

Details

By the way, here’s the match details thanks to FCBarcelona.com:

TIGRES: Hernández, Balderas, Briceño (Campos 73′), Sánchez, Saritama (Escudero 79′), Méndez, Montano (Cerda 51′), Lozano (Ribas 79′), Restrepo, Gaitán y Zárate (González 76′).
FC BARCELONA: Valdés (Rubén 45′), Belletti (Sylvinho 45′), Oleguer (Puyol 63′), Olmo, Márquez (Edmílson 31′, Motta 45′), Jordi Gómez (Ronaldinho 63′), Marc Crosas, Iniesta (Sastre 33′), Giovani (Saviola 45′, Riera 77′), Eto’o (Gudjohnsen 45′) y Ezquerro (Guily 45′).

Árbitro: Arnando Archundia (México)

Goles: 0-1, Balderas (o.g.) (7′); 0-2, Ronaldinho (70′); 0-3, Gudjohnsen (77′).

Asistencia: 43.000 espectadores

This northern summer, Barsa will be visiting the US (lucky guys) and play some games to show some magic.

With new players and some youngsters, FCB is ready to do some goals and show some football.
The schedule for this games is:

(All times are GMT+1, check: http://www.timeanddate.com to convert it to your local time)
Friday, 4 Aug, Club Tigres-FCB (03:00). On Tour USA 2006
Monday, 7 Aug, Chivas Guadalajara-FCB (03:30). On Tour USA’06
Thursday, 10 Aug, Club América-FCB (04:30). On Tour USA’06
Sunday, 13 Aug, New York Red Bulls-FCB (01:30). On Tour USA’06

First Barsa oponent will be Club Tigres, this team is one of the most popular Mexican equipos. Surely it will not be an easy match but we know that Barsa will show why it is the best team in the world.

Next, El Chivas. This team is by far one of the biggest American (as in North, Central and South) teams, with a great selection of players and a really big number of supporters Barsa will have again a rough time.

América is a team that can be compared to FCB in terms of fanatics, it has a GREAT supporter base with people that live for the club. This is by far the most awaited match because of the great feelings that both teams carry to the field.

Last but not least, NY Red Bulls will try to show that USA has some good football to show. I must say that this match looks very promising since Bulls will surely want to show that they are a great team and what would be a better way than having a good match with FCB?.

That’s all for now, remember that Supercopa Española and UEFA Supercup are coming very soon! I’ll be reporting this soon!

Futbol Club Barcelona was founded in 1899 by a group of young footballers led by Hans Gamper. It’s best known as Barcelona or just Barça, the nickname comes from the mix of the Barcelona (pronounced Barsalona in catalán) and the nickname given to the supporters of the club: ‘culés’.
As a matter of fact, the name of the club has the word ‘Futbol’ without aacute because in catalán you don’t accentuate that word (in opposition to spanish were you would write Fútbol).

The beginnings

Started as a soccer club, other sports soon joined the pool of options of the club. As of 2006 the club has professional teams in: basketball, handball, roller hockey and futsal. Of course soccer is still the most representative part of the club, 75% of the budget is used in this discipline.

In 1928 La Liga was founded being Barça one of the founders, since then Barça has always been in Primera División.
Barça has won the last two seasons of La Liga, this year FCB also won The Champion’s League in an almost heart killing Finale.

FCB was founded November 29 of 1899, Hans Gamper published a Nota de Sport in the local diary Los Deportes announcing his intention to form a club and inviting others to join him.
After the first decade, the club had already some titles on the trophy room: a Copa de España and a Copa de los Pirineos.

At early ’10s, more and more fans became members of the club, at that time FCB had 3000 members. This was the time when the term ‘culés’ became popular among people.
The club also won 2 Copas de España and 3 Copas de los Pirineos.

The golden age

People like to say that the ’20s was the golden age of the club, the number of members went from 3000 culés to 11000. Also in 1926 the first stadium of the club, Les Corts, was opened to the public allowing at most 30000 fans.
In the sporting area, 4 Copas de España and in 1929 the first Liga Española in the history.

In the ’30s the club was in serious trouble, Hans Gamper died, later the Segunda República made a lot of members leave the club. It went even worse when the Guerra Civil Española started. After this tragic period the club had no more than 2500 members.

The franquismo

Of course, the blaugrana spirit came over all this problems and in the ’40s the club started to recover. Sadly the franquistas took over the club and until 1953 they directly named the president and vanished every single piece of catalán or english influence.
Not everything was bad news, even with the problems and franquismo in the club, FCB finished this decade with around 25000 members.

But future wasn’t so bright…

Continues in the next post…

barcelona barca history historia cules club futbol españa spain soccer