Kielty and Ferrer

I had the first-time experience of properly watching a La Liga match on Sky Sports last Saturday. My usual m.o. is to frantically search the vault of Sopcast or JustinTV in the hopes of finding coverage of the game where 1) the ball is visible, and 2) it doesn't cut out every 3 minutes. Given that these two things can be hard to come by for Spanish games, I'm more than willing to settle for Japanese commentary, or coverage where there are so many little information boxes on the screen that the only thing you can see is the ball. This is all part of the price you pay for being cheap, so far be it from me to complain.

Of course all of this meant that seeing a game on an actual television was such a treat for me. I didn't care that the presenter looked like the love-child of Paul Bettany and Patrick Kielty. In fact that was a plus if anything. Neither did the fact that Albert Ferrer was the one and only analyst bother me. OK it did bother me. But having only one analyst always bothers me. In fact, analysts in general bother me, but that's another issue entirely. The point is, Albert Ferrer has strange hair and therefore he can't be trusted. That is the point, isn't it?

To be honest, I didn't hear either Patrick Bettany or Albert Ferrer say much, but that may well have been for the best. What I did behold was a very good Barcelona team, and two very good goals scored by the best player in the world. His second was more and more impressive every time I saw it. A pinpoint pass from Hleb (whose passing is extremely underrated) played Messi through, he had a quick glance at where the goals were in relation to where he was, took the ball beyond the keeper, and stroked it confidently into the net from around the edge of the box without so much as peeking at the goalposts a second time. A good player may well have carried the ball too far beyond the keeper, or hit the shot into the side-netting. But Messi did it all to perfection, making it look easier than it actually was. Can he get any better than this? Does he need to?

On the general subject of FC Barcelona, I'd be utterly shocked if they don't win the league. And if any club outside of England is going to win the Champions League, it will be the Catalan giants. There is very little I'm more sure about in life than that. In compelete disarray, the came mighty close to knocking Man Utd out of the competition last season, so who knows what they will be capable of in the months to come. RTE's *cough* student of the Spanish game Eamonn Dunphy is tipping Barcelona for mounting a serious threat, though I'm sure it comes with a warning that Puyol is rubbish and that "they're hopeless at the back, Bill". Of course they are still vulnerable in defense, but it took a corker from Scholes to break them last season, and they certainly haven't gotten any worse since then. Although that said, I have serious reservations about the defensive capabilites of Dani Alves. To be honest, in all the games I've watched I haven't actually seen him defend, so it will be interesting to see him pitted against a formidable winger such as, um, Albert Reira [?]. (As a sidenote, who are the good wingers these days, or does the position even exist anymore?)

All in all, it was a Saturday night well spent, and it certainly beat causing further damage to my eyes trying to make out where the ball was, and cursing Justin (whoever he is) when those horrible words "not broadcasting" appear on the bottom of my laptop screen. And always at a crucial moment as well. You do that on purpose, don't you? Damn you Justin...and your TV.