FC Barcelona expands US presence

The Spanish squad has announced and expansion in his projects in United State with a partnership with ISL Futbol. Thanks to this agreement, ISL Futbol and his new partner FCBEscola Florida will start to host soccer training camps in some North American cities.

FCBEscola is the soccer academy following the Barcelona model and aimed to boys and girls between 6 and 11 years.

They teach the boys and girls the basic concepts of soccer while teaching them the representative values of FC Barcelona such as tolerance, respect, solidarity, integration, effort and happiness. This concepts will allow the players to be able to deal with their sporting challenges in the future.

FCBEscola uses the same training methods as by the youth teams of the club, with exercises adapted to each training level or stage.

Coaches from the youth academy will travel to each city to teach this methodology that players such, Xavi, Andres Iniesta or Lionel Mess have learned.

Director Xavier Marcé said that he is delighted to view and be part of such a fast growing soccer community in America and that they will try to have a big impact on players development.

The camps will be held in Charlotte, Raleigh, Cincinnati and Virginia.

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Athletic Bilbao 2, Barcelona 5

Barcelona won, once again, their last La Liga match over a 10 men Athletic Bilbao on Sunday, with a  5-2 victory at San Mames and closed the gap with La Liga leaders Real Madrid to just one point.

The Catalans scored their first goal just 15 minutes after the start of the match, thanks again to an inspired Lionel Messi. Messi free Kick just outside of the box was deflected by Bilbao wall and wrong footed the goalkeeper.

Just eleven minutes later, Luis Suarez doubled the lead and again Messi out on the right received the ball after a usual stylish build for Barcelona and then the Argentinian laid the ball to Suarez who fired from outside of the box.

Fifteen minutes into the second half, Bilbao scored their first goal through Mikel Rico after a first save for Barcelona goalkeeper, and this started a crazy seven minutes of goal scoring action.

Two minutes after Bilbao’s score, Barcelona regained their two goal advantage through De Marcos own goal, Messi diverted a cross back across goal and the ball hit the chest of De Marcos.

Then Neymar scored the fourth just three minutes later with a typical move, Messi played the ball across the box to Neymar and he made no mistake. And Bilbao just two minutes after Neymar score was able to decrease Barcelona advantage thanks to Aduriz, beating Claudio Bravo and ending a goal period.

But the game was over just fifteen minutes before the end when Xavier Etxeita saw a deserved red card after stopping Luis Suarez at the center of the pitch.

But The Catalans still were able to score another goal, a sublime Messi jiggled at the 18 yard box and played to Sergio Busquets who then put the ball in Pedro’s feet who completed the scoring.

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Barcelona back in style

Early this January, Barcelona had a great deal of criticism after their defeat against Real Sociedad, but Luis Enrique has been able to turn the situation around and their last victory over Villarreal has extended the current streak to an impressive eight consecutive victories.

Most likely the change in Luis Enrique rotation policy has made the difference, after 28 different line-ups in the same number of matches.

While still there is a lot of work and tweaks to make, all the fans now know that the preferred starting eleven has a front line formed with Neymar, Mess and Suarez, a middle triangle with Andres Iniesta and Rakitic in front of Sergio Busquets, Alves and Alba as fullbacks and Mascherano and Pique at the heart of the defense; finally there is no doubt about the goalkeeper where Claudio Bravo has earned that position.

With all the minutes for this men, this is helping to tune up the game and put into play some tactical mechanisms and allowing individuals to bring their full potential in the pitch and bring the very best out of each other.

This was clearly seen in their last match against Villarreal and the team was able to work as a unit to overcome the visitors. They were facing a well organized rival and even took the lead twice at Camp Nou, but The Catalans where able to pull through and it was nice to see a team secure of themselves and able to keep the three points in this difficult fixture.

Two of the most notable players in 2015 have been Messi and Neymar and their contribution to the majority of the goals after the winter break. Their connection is growing week after week and are becoming more effective as time go on.

Even with 5 goals, there is a number of fans that are wondering if the 81 million euro payed for Luis Suarez are worth. While he is fighting and has a great generosity and winning attitude, his scoring results are far from what is expected from the last Golden Boot winner. But not everything is lost and the Uruguayan must keep working to regain his former composure as soon as possible.

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Messi to stay with Barcelona

In an interview, this season’s Barcelona coach Luis Enrique has commented that he expects team star Lionel Messi to remain with Barcelon for many years ending reports of a rift between the two.

According to the repports, Messi was unhappy with the current management, tactics and style of the coach and it was said that he was looking for an exit and sparking interest from Chelsea, Manchester United and Manchester City.

But in the last week, Messi said that he has no plans to exit the club that he joined when he was 13-year-old but hasn’t denied the rumors about the lack of understanding with Luis Enrique, who took over from Gerardo Martino this season.

Given that Messi, four times world player of the year has a great influence at Barcelona it was expected that Luis Enrique was the one who could leave, a possibility increased after sporting director Andoni Zubizarreta was sacked a couple of weeks ago.

Luis Enrique expressed that “Leo is going to stay at Barça for many years, that is what everybody wants”, also he commented that all the Barcelona dressing room is united.

He said that the team is united in the same from and they discuss ways to improve the performance o how hey can damage the opponent, a normal dynamic for any football team.

Barcelona’s president, Josep Bartomeu also talked about Messi and he said to Catalunya Radio that Messi told him that he wants to stay and finish his career at Barcelona. The commitment and willingness are at his peak, said the president.

President’s words came after Lionel Messi said at the Ballon d’Or galla that he doesn’t know where he will be next year.

This last month was one of the most difficult for Barcelona in recent years after they lost the appeal of the transfer ban, called for early elections this summer and sacked its sports director Zubizarreta.

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Elche 0, Barcelona 4

Barcelona ended hi quarter-final Copa del Rey with a victory over Elche 4-0 and an aggregate of 9-0 for the Catalans.

Barcelona sealed his presence in the last eight thanks to the goals of Mathieu, Sergi Roberto and Pedro in the first half of the game and they will met Atletico Madrid again.

Barcelona had met Atletico Madrid just once in last Sunday’s La Liga clash at Camp Nou with a final result of 3-1 for the Catalans Giants.

Luis Enrique and the rest of the team knows that a victory in the next two matches of Copa del Rey will put them in a good spot to lift Copa del Rey for a record 27th time after Real Madrid was knocked out on Thursday.

Mathieu was the first to score with a fenomenal 25-year free-kick followed by Sergi who fired a long-distance effort and finally the first half ended with Pedro scoring a 43rd-minute penalty and continuing his love affair with the Copa del Rey.

In the second half Halilovic hit the post when Barcelona was pressing for a fourth goal, a feat that arrived thanks to Adriano in the 91st minute.

Both teams made a lot of changes and Luis Enrique brought six players from Barcelona B team, the front three was formed by Munir El Haddadi, Adama Traore and Pedro. Elche made nine alterations themselves.

Elche also had their opportunities in the match in the boots of Cristian Herrera, but a perfect Mathieu gave Barcelona the lead.

But with a 3-0 result at the end of the first half, the second half was a bit dull with the match petering out significantly in the larger stages with Barcelona thinking already in his next rival Atletico Madrid. The presence of the croatian Halilovic was the only highlight in the last half and he was nearly able to make his debut for Barcelona with a goal.

In the last minutes of this last half, Adriano scored the forth and final goal for Barcelona and the visitors ending a perfect Copa del Rey round.

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Barcelona rumors

During the last weeks crisis, the spanish media has been speculating if Luis Enrique will finish this season, and, of course, questions where raised about the possible return of Pep Guardiola to replace Enrique while he is in Doha.

But Pep quickly responded to this questions and said that he is not the solution to the problem, and also that they are a lot of other great options and he is sure that the right decisions will be made to maintain Barcelona as one of the greatest in the world.

The possible return of Laporta and run for Barcelona’s presidency in 2016 came with rumors about Pep and making him the sporting director. Pep didn’t deny the rumors, but he also said that Laporta never said that, it never came out of his mouth.

Bayern already told to Guardiola that they are willing to discuss the contract extension when he is prepared, but there’s still enough time for him to make a decission.

Also, Messi has finally spoken about last weeks rumors of him leaving Barcelona. But Messi insisted that he doesn’t want to leave The Catalans and the reports saying that he is asking for Luis Enrique to be sacked are lies.

This comments is what all the fans around the world want to hear and they also hope for all the parties to put all of this behind and focus on football.

Messi also responded to all this talk with what he does best, scoring, and after the 5-0 demolition of Elche in Copa del Rey he helped his team with the 3-1 victory against Atlético Madrid with the typical Messi master class.

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Copa del Rey: FC Barcelona vs Elche CF

With just one week into this new year, FC Barcelona is now in the first crisis of the year, and a big one; in just a few days, they have managed to loose at Anoeta, sack their sporting director Zubizarreta, watched the departure of Carles Pujol and now in early presidential elections.

And all of this not mentioning the possibility of a growing feud between star Lionel Messi and coach Luis Enrique.

It’s a had way to start a year, but we all hope to change today when Barcelona will return to Copa del Rey hosting a match against Elche at Camp Nou.

Last month a match against such a low opposition will not be a threat to the Catalans Giants, but after the past days, this could be the match that Barcelona needs to end it all. A defeat will most likely bring the end of Luis Enrique’s reign as head coach and might also end the Barcelona dreams for this season.

However a good performance tonight might bring down the tension and pressure at the club, if you are on the bottom, the only way is to go up.

Luis Enrique’s rotations has opened a debate whether this constant tinkering has affected player morale and results. Resting players after an international break is good, but benching players after a long vacation is not.

A common misconception is that football must be won in the pitch with only a physical battle of 22 players, but in reality is also the mental state, tactics and motivation the key cornerstones; and Luis Enrique is not able to deliver in this respect.

But, in spite of everything, not only Luis Enrique or the players have to be the only contributing factors for this fall from grace. Yes, Luis Enrique tactical blunders and non existing man management skills are to be blamed, but also Sandro Rosell and Josep Maria Bartomeu for their boardroom level mistakes and sacked Andoni Zubizarreta for his as Sporting Director.

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