The match kicked off at nine — only in Spain could a match be played at a time when many Englishmen are very sensibly thinking about going to bed — and straight away there was Messi, right in front of me and looking smaller and frankly much less happy than the doll wearing the number ten shirt I’d seen at Barcelona Airport. His twinkle-toes were working better than his smile, however, and he reminded me of Gene Kelly tap-dancing his way through Singing in the Rain, or Fred Astaire in Top Hat.
A lot is made of the rivalry that exists between FCB’s Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo at Real Madrid. And I’m sometimes asked, who is the better player? Which one would you have wanted to come to a club that you were managing? The truth is they’re very different players. The taller more muscular Ronaldo is a consummate athlete, while the five-foot-six-inch Messi is more like an artist. Ronaldo seems more arrogant, too, and I can take or leave his strutting torero act that he puts on when he scores a goal. It’s like he expects the ears and the tail of the bull he has vanquished to be given to him. Me, on the rare occasions I ever scored a goal, I always looked around to thank the guy who’d passed me the fucking ball. It just seemed like good manners. You pays your money, you take your choice.
Reading the match programme I half-expected to see Barca‘s newest striker, Jérôme Dumas — reportedly now on loan from PSG — among the reserves at least, but there was no sign of him as yet. I was, however, delighted to see a match with Barca’s leading three scorers — Messi, Neymar and Suarez — leading their attack. It was all shaping up to be an exciting evening, as it’s not often you get a chance to see three of the best players in the world in action at the same time.
The game started with Villarreal in possession but Messi’s skilful moves managed to put Barca back in command and Villarreal showed quickly that ultimately they lacked the balance, intensity and speed of the Barca team at its best. But Barca too were misfiring. Suarez had three early goal-scoring chances with only one on target — a point-blank salvo turned away by Villarreal keeper Asenjo after just thirteen minutes. Number 16, Dos Santos, missed three scoring chances, again saved by Asenjo. With such chances coming, the Barca supporters waited patiently for a goal, but after half an hour of play, things did not go their way. Villarreal’s Gaspar unleashed a left-footed blast that looked destined for the other side of the field until Tcherychev deflected the ball past Barca keeper: 0–1 to Villarreal.
The goal had a predictably unsettling effect on the Barca players. Their energy disappeared, the team looked demoralised. The crowd fell silent. And the responsibility to get Barca back in the game fell again to Messi. One minute before half time he seized his chance. His searching pass found Rafinha in the area whose shot was saved by Asenjo, but the rebound fell to Neymar who banged it in without a moment’s hesitation.
Having equalised, Barca returned in the second half transformed. They pressured and threatened, proving why very few other teams cause so much disarray in opposing teams on and off the ball, both in defence and attack.
Nevertheless, Piqué’s defensive mistake allowed Villarreal’s Giovani to take advantage and assist Vietto’s strike, to make it 1–2 to Villarreal in the fifty-first minute. Camp Nou went silent again as if the crowd realised that the Yellow Submarine wasn’t going to go down easily. Just as the silence was becoming even more uneasy, both Suarez and Messi were denied before Rafinha scored the equaliser. 2–2. The cheering culers had just taken their seats when, in the fifty-fifth minute, Lio Messi let fly with a beautiful curving shot from outside the penalty area. With little or no room for the strike it seemed like the kind of goal that perhaps only Messi could have envisaged, let alone scored. 3–2 to Barcelona.
The last half-hour saw Barca nervously protecting their lead, and slowly they wore the other side down. Near the end Rafinha was substituted and, feeling very cold — as the evening progressed the night grew colder and so did I, I’d forgotten must how cold Barcelona can be in winter — and irritated with what looked like an obvious attempt on the part of Barca to delay the game, I tweeted something stupid about how he was being taken off because it was his period. It was the same sort of Cranberry Juice Joke that’s in Scorsese’s film, The Departed. But at the time I thought no more about it.
The match finished. Villarreal had lost for the first time since November. But for Barcelona the win — which left them four points off Real Madrid at the top of La Liga — seemed typical of their lacklustre season: the flashes of brilliance were few and far between and they made it look hard work. As we would have said in England, they ’won ugly’. But they still won so most of the crowd went home happy. Frankly, I thought Villarreal — who had a goal disallowed for offside — were very unlucky not to go home with a draw.
The next day — which was no less cold — Jacint Grangel took me to lunch at the Drolma Restaurant in the Majestic Hotel — one of the best in the city. To be honest it’s a little grand for my taste. I prefer somewhere more authentically Catalan, like Cañete in the older part of town. (Whenever I’m there I think of Hemingway; I’ve no idea if he ever went to Cañete but there’s a big ibex head on the wall that makes me think he’d have liked the place.) But then again I wasn’t paying. Drolma’s chef, Nandu Jubany, is considered to be the great genius of Catalan cuisine and it’s easy to see why; I’d forgotten just how good lollipops of foie gras with white chocolate and Porto reduction can taste.
When I arrived at Drolma with Jacint there were others already seated at the table; three men, each wearing a sober blue suit with a shirt and tie. That’s the thing about Barcelona; everyone dresses well. No one would dream of turning up for lunch at a place like Drolma wearing a tracksuit and sports shoes. A lot of the time I look at players and the way they dress and think they need a good slap. There was another vice-president from Barcelona called Oriel Domench i Montaner, but I was surprised to be introduced to Charles Rivel, from Paris Saint-Germain, and a Qatari called Ahmed Wusail Abbasid bani Utbah. At least I think that’s what his name was. It’s possible the guy was just clearing his throat.
We spoke in Spanish. I can manage a bit of Catalan — which is an interesting, almost hermetic combination of French, Spanish, Italian and awkward-squad bloody-mindedness — but Spanish is easier for me. It’s easier for everyone who doesn’t speak Catalan. Catalans are very proud of their language and rightly so; under General Franco they had to fight very hard to keep their culture alive. Or so they’ll tell you. The same is true of the football club. Or so they’ll tell you. In 1936 Franco’s troops shot dead the president of the club, Josep Suñol, and to this day he is known as the ‘martyr president’. That sort of thing tends to put English opposition to the people like the Glazers and Mike Ashley in the shade. And perhaps it also explains why this club, which was founded by a group of English, Swiss and Catalans, is considered to be més que un club — more than a club. FC Barcelona is a way of life. Or so they’ll tell you.