Messi’s Goals Worthy of Praise

Thank the world for Lionel Messi. Without him, without the two goals he scored for Barcelona to beat Real Madrid, 2-0, in Madrid’s Bernabeu stadium Wednesday night, soccer would now be lamenting the ugly face of the millionaires’ game.

As it turned out, Messi’s goals, the second when he took on the entire Madrid defense on his own, turned brutishness into beauty.

The outcome left Barcelona the favorite to finish off Madrid in the second leg of the Champions League semifinal Tuesday in its home stadium. It leaves the probable final of the top European competition a rematch, at London’s Wembley Stadium, of the 2009 final in Rome between Barcelona and Manchester United.

But before that there will be all manner of inquests concerning the way the Spanish giants fought Wednesday’s first leg. Real Madrid and Barcelona field two of the most expensively assembled lineups in history. And there should be a serious inquiry by UEFA, Europe’s soccer authority, into the behavior of Madrid’s Portuguese coach, José Mourinho.

Mourinho raged in the postmatch news conference. He played his familiar tune, insinuating that there is a conspiracy against him, and a conspiracy between Barcelona and the match officials to prevent his team from advancing.

But let’s first describe Messi’s goals before letting Mourinho grab the headlines he so often seeks.

The first goal, after 76 minutes, was a quick, darting action worth more than all the negativity that had spoiled the match to that point. Messi had appeared to run into a blind alley as he lost the ball when surrounded by four opponents outside the Madrid penalty box.

But while the defenders relaxed, Messi kept running. His colleague, the substitute Ibrahim Afellay, spotted that movement and played an excellently weighted pass toward the near post. Messi pounced on it and volleyed in his 51st goal of the season.

To score once in the Bernabeu was a joy, to do it twice beyond expectation — even for Messi. But Messi, a diminutive Argentine with gargantuan talents, danced his way through a startled, exhausted Real once more before the final whistle.

Real had six defenders between Messi and the net when he received the ball from a crafty, nonchalant flick from Xavi Hernández. What followed was pure Messi, pure genius. The first opponent to him, Lassana Diarra, attempted to block him with a body check. Messi felt the contact but wriggled away.

The next challenger, Álvaro Arbeloa, failed to make contact with Messi or the ball. And the next, the Brazilian fullback Marcelo, was simply outpaced as Messi rushed past him, the ball a magnet to Messi’s feet. Then, the coup de grâce, Messi pulled goalkeeper Iker Casillas toward him and stroked the ball along the ground inside the far post.

Two magic moments, from a magician in soccer shoes. Everyone by now knows what Messi is capable of doing, but knowing it and preventing it are poles apart.

Those goals transcended a night of seething, spiteful, dreadful spectacle.

What had gone before descended into antisoccer. Real fielded, again, a team with seven defenders, leaving some of its star attacking players on the bench. The tactic was to suffocate Barcelona, to prevent its rhythm.

One wondered, even before the affair turned truly nasty, how long Mourinho’s methods will be tolerated at Real Madrid. The club regards itself, with good reason, to be the most illustrious in the world. It has spent, on this team and others before it, record sums on forwards, from Alfredo Di Stefano a half-century ago to Cristiano Ronaldo today.

Mourinho arrived as coach last summer, principally because of his reputation as being able to prepare and motivate teams to beat Barcelona. But on Wednesday, as in previous encounters with Mourinho’s clubs, the provocative methods persuaded the referee to send off a player for excessive force.

At halftime, the German referee Wolfgang Stark, red carded Barcelona’s reserve goalie, José Manuel Pinto, during a brawl at the mouth of the tunnel. In the 61st minute, Stark showed a straight red card to Madrid’s Pepe for a high and reckless tackle on Dani Alves.

That was Mourinho’s cue to mock the fourth official on the sideline. “Well done!” the coach said, again and again. The referee responded by sending off Mourinho, too, ordering him to the stands.

Inevitably, Mourinho cried victimization afterward. He railed against officialdom, repeating what he has claimed for years: that there is a conspiracy against him and his teams, a conspiracy that enables Barcelona to win trophies assisted by the lawmakers.

Mourinho, once an assistant to Barcelona coaches, has since had seven players sent off against Barca, with three different teams — Chelsea, Inter Milan and Madrid. In each of his team’s last five matches against Barcelona, his team has finished a man down, hence the Mourinho conspiracy theory.

He cried foul on Wednesday, rather than acknowledge Messi.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: May 2, 2011


The On Soccer column on Thursday, about Real Madrid’s 2-0 victory over Barcelona, misspelled the surname of Lionel Messi’s teammate who assisted on one of his two goals. It is Ibrahim Afellay, not Affelay.


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