4-0... dang!

So, was that the end of the 2013 UEFA Champions League for Barça?
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by PAM


4-0!  Ugh! 

I gotta admit, that 'killed' me a little bit.  I'm kinda dead right now... oh, boy!  'Cause since when did Barça - "Pep Guardiola's Barça", that is - got so effectively annihilated like that?  So, okay, they are no longer Guardiola's Barça 'cause they are now Tito Vilanova's Barça... and yet, it was Pep who assembled the core of the present Barça.  They no longer play as fiercely as they did under Pep's heavily dramatic direction, but the brilliance is still there.  Tito is as cool as Pep is as passionate.  I guess a team like Barça tends to operate more effectively under a heavily passionate shepherd?  Maybe....

But, 4-0 in the semi-final of UEFA Champions League?  Really??  4-0??  Wow!  What's worse was that Lionel Messi was in Barça's starting XI in the Allianz Arena... what the heck

The unfamiliar look of defeat... 4-0. Aw, man! 

(Credit:  John Sibley/Action Images)

happened???  Aw, excuse my language... it's just hard, hard, HARD!  It's hard to accept that stunningly comprehensive defeat, the kind of defeat that Barça usually hand down to their hopeless and helpless opponents... including the Bavarians - in the past.  But, 4-0?  Man, totally heartbreaking! 

Don't get me wrong, I am not trying to diminish the brilliance of Bayern Munich.  Boy, they were good!  If I weren't a Barça fan, I'd definitely root for them... there was no weakness in their artillery... the frontline was brisk, daring and accurate, their midfield strong, sharp and fast, and their defense was a brickwall - in the Great Wall of China fashion, too!  In fact, I've always believed that they should have won the Champions League last year.  Well, just because Barça's game got 'hijacked' by the ultra-heavy double-wall defense of Chelsea FC last year.     

Speaking of defense... I hate to say this, but Barça's defense sucked!  If it was true that FC Barcelona have lost their 'aura', it's only because their defense is 'light weight'.  Man, when will the Barça 'back' going to get the major overhaul and thorough reinforcement that it needs?  By 'overhaul', I'm not referring to Gerard Piqué's change of hairstyle/headstyle.  :)  Then again, the Catalans maybe undergoing 'a phase'... several of them started a family lately.  So, there's hope.   

But, yeah, there's that return leg to Camp Nou... the Catalans have a chance to assert their supremacy there.  With the Catalan crowd blowing on their sail, they might just find their second wind... after all, that ball is round, it could roll whichever way one kicks it to, and the wind could aid.  Besides, miracles do happen, ya know. 

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The Lessons of Allianz Arena

I usually liken football, and it's dramas, with life... and, a-hem, it's dramas! :)  From the result of the first leg of the UEFA Champions League semi-final tie between Bayern Munich and FC Barcelona, it is obvious that even the most formidable of a team could fade in the shadow of defeat, if it's weakness was not remedied, reinforced and

Thomas Mueller, drawing 'first blood'.  Whew!

(Credit:  Getty Images)

constantly rejuvenated, and if it wouldn't pay close attention to what is out there issuing challenge - new challenge - against it. 

In the case of Barça, time and again, it had been pointed out that their defense is weak.  Of course, Pep Guardiola always argued then that that wouldn't be a problem if they had a strong frontline and midfield, which would effectively bring the ball at play on their opponent's half of the field.  It worked then... because their style almost always confined the competition in their opponent's half of the field - it was Pep's trade secret.  However, these days, many teams have already figured that out... when Pep left Camp Nou, he knew that his secret was out.  It was up to the new guys in the Coaching Staff to figure out a way to contain the new challenge that presses Barça to move back farther and farther to their backline... exposing their weak defense.  Every Barça fan knew that it was only a matter of time before a brilliant (and even a not-so-brilliant) coach would figure out how to dissolve the highly 'soluble' Catalan defense.  These days, many in the Champions League circle seemed to have figured it out, and they are out to try their formula to dissolve the Catalan defense.  Jupp Heynckes took a shot, and Barça fell with a black eye and swollen lip.  Dang!    

An organization or Institution - even the most accomplished -  could fall in the same bitter defeat, when it fails to do something on its weaknesses... most of all, if it failed to see, or admit, its weaknesses because of pride, selfishness... and defiance of authority.  A weakness cannot be repaired and turned to a strength unless it is recognized, acknowledged and figured out.  And, if 'winning' is an objective, that first step has to be taken - humbly, responsibly, selflessly.

Barça had Leo Messi - probably the best football player the world has ever seen - and yet, they were reduced to a shameful remnant of a glorious show of brilliance by 

Individual brilliance is good... but winning also 

requires teamwork, selflessness and humility.

(Credit: Dean Mouhtaropoulos/Getty Images Europe)  

their opponent, Bayern Munich, in a total demolition, 4-0.  Of course, football is a team sport, and therefore, every single player's contribution counts, and that winning should not depend on one player alone - even if he was the best player in the world.  That's where the Bavarians excelled over Vilanova's Barça... all sections in their line-up was well-oiled, well-calibrated, and well aware of the danger that their counterparts in Barça posed.  Therefore, each section linked up nicely, working together, pressing, especially the scattered Barça defense to a mere flimsy resistance, putting Messi's brilliance to almost irrelevance... if that was at all possible!    

4-0... in real life, one should be bothered by it.  It should compel any responsible leader and concerned members of any organization or Institution to step aside and lift that pride on which they stood in defiance... and see how much damage such pride had caused the very foundation of their organization... and then do something about the damage. 

In football tie, there is a return leg - for  a second chance.  In real life, there might not always be a second chance.

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