Firstly I am not one of the people who wants to crown this Barcelona team as the best side ever assembled since I never like to try and compare teams across generations because the game is constantly changing. For me though this team will go down as one of the best in my lifetime and one of the best that I have been able to watch without having to go back into the archives. The team that Cruyff built in 1988 is in my opinion still slightly better then this one but it is hard to argue with the success that Pep Guardiola who has won everything there is since taken over in 2008. His side with Messi, Xavi, Iniesta and co has proven that they are the very best in Europe by winning 2 of the last 3 champions league titles as well as 3 straight La Liga titles. They have clearly opened up a bit of a gap over free spending Spanish rivals Real Madrid as well as over Manchester United who they have now beaten out twice in the CL finals.
For fans of other clubs in Europe that have ambitions of winning the Champions League the challenge is clear. If you want to be the very best then Barcelona are the standard by which you are going to be judged. They have proven that if they are playing anywhere near their very best then not even the very best of any other club is going to be enough to stop them. With Messi scoring at the rate he does and being supported by such a talented group they are a team that all you can really do is slow them down and hope that they make a costly mistake but even that is unlikely to happen.
In their four key meetings with Real Madrid this season Barca showed that they were simply the better side and even with Mourinho employing some questionable tactics to try and put them off their possession style of play they were able to win La Liga and the CL semi finals. Real can take solace in the fact that they won the Copa but even then it took extra time and a bit of luck as they were forced to play a defensive game. It was made clear that even the daring Jose Mourinho was not willing to come out and try to attack Barca but preferred to sit back and wait to try and hit them on a counter attack. The approach worked 1 time out or 4 but in a one and done format like the Champions League format those are not very good odds.
For Manchester United it was clear that they learned a lot from their previous finals encounter with Barca but even all that knowledge was nothing when it came to trying to close down a clear skill gap. Most United fans will admit that this was not a vintage side and was certainly not one that was expected to go all the way to this years finals along with winning the Premiership but once they got there you are always going to have the belief that you can win the match. Luck was not on the side of United though and Barcelona showed that they are just that much better then United and when they are on their game not even the best effort from Sir Alex's men is going to be enough.
So the pressure is on for the Real's, United's, Chelsea's, Milan's, Inter's and anyone else out there who thinks they are Champions League contenders. Barcelona make no secrets of how they are going to line up and who they prefer to play so now other teams are going to have to spend the money to bring in the sort of players that are capable of reaching the level that Barcelona routinely play at. Right now United and Real seem to be the closest to reaching that level but even they still have some ways to go before they can stand toe to toe with the Catalan giants. Sadly though the current Barcelona squad is not even all that old and will likely remain together for a fair few more years and is sure to win a few more trophies in that time so waiting for them to come back down to other teams levels seems hopeless. There is a belief though in both Manchester and Real that they will be able to close this gap down and both sides will be hoping to get another shot at Barcelona on the biggest stage in next years Champions League.
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