God Is Catalan, And Represents The Blaugrana: Barcelona Book Ticket To Rome

Divine intervention. That can be the only explanation for today's events.

In the preview to the Champions League semi-finals, I picked Barcelona to beat Chelsea -- despite my rational self urging me not to -- because I believed they were a team of destiny. To quote Slumdog Millionaire, it is written.

Count 'em, three penalty shouts, two of them stonewall (the Pique handball, and the Alves-Malouda tug of war in and around the box). Numerous chances on goal, all but one cleared by the much-maligned Victor Valdes. A ludicrous red card on Abidal, leaving Barcelona with ten men, down a goal, away in the second leg of a Champions League semi-final. A Chelsea defense so resolute that Barcelona managed a grand total of zero shots on target in the first 93 minutes.

And yet...

Barcelona are going to Rome, not because they were the better team today but because it was Right. Over the one hundred and eighty minutes, one team played to win, the other not to lose. Why else would Chelsea have played so timidly with a goal and a man advantage, at home no less, when Barca were tired as hell? Were Barcelona lucky? Hell, yes. But how many times have Barcelona been the better team and lost, or gone out? Too many to count. Once in a while, it's truly joyous to be on the other side of an unfair result.

And make no mistake, Chelsea played close to a perfect game today, except for the ball-less display after the Abidal red. Drogba, when he wasn't auditioning for a role in the latest Die Hard, was a monster -- quick, powerful, direct. Malouda was a constant threat down the left, and kept Alves deeper than Guardiola would have liked. And the defense, as it was last week, was enormously successful in keeping Messi from dominating -- shadowing him with three players any time he got close to the ball, it was up to Messi's teammates to take advantage. They could not, because Chelsea were too organized.

One also has to question Guardiola's tactics and lineup. As we all know, he had a very difficult decision with both Marques and Puyol out: who to play centre-back? The first option was to slot Sylvinho in at left back, and slide Abidal over. But Abidal has been terrible as a CB for France, and Sylvinho is 35 years old and not very quick. The second option was to keep Abidal on the left, and play Caceres, an earnest and enthusiastic tackler, but one prone to rashness and the occassional brain-fart. I actually favored playing Caceres -- on a hunch more than anyting -- because I thought in a sink or swim type situation, he would swim. And he would have the pace to hang with Anelka and Drogba too.

As it happened, Pep went for the strangest option which was to slot Yaya in the CB role, and play Busquets. As soon as I read the team-sheet, I was worried. First of all, it doesn't matter that Yaya is one of the three best defensive midfielders in the world -- he's not a CB, and you can't simply construct one in such an important game. Second, it would mean that we lose Yaya in the Yaya role, where he does more than break up tackles; at his best, Yaya is a strong driving force, and gets many of Barca's forays started. Busquets, for all his potential, can not and could not play that role. And because of Yaya not playing the Yaya role, Keita was lost too -- not knowing where he was supposed to be or what he was supposed to do. In effect, in trying to plug one hole, Guardiola created three. I hope that he sees that the Yaya-as-CB experiment was a failure, and plays Caceres in the final.

Speaking of which, while there will be plenty of time to preview that game, do you think I might get a shot at playing wing back for Barca? Abidal is out, as is Alves (which might not actually be the worst thing in the world, to be honest). I guess Puyol might play right-back and Sylvinho will play on the left. But I really, really hope Guardiola doesn't get any funny ideas about playing midfielders in defensive roles. Roll the dice with the back four, and play the regular Yaya-Iniesta-Xavi-Henry-Eto'o-Messi front six, and see what happens.

One important point to make is that Barcelona simply never gave up. They played hard -- really hard -- for the full length of the game. Iniesta was simply immense, as were Pique and Valdes. And Messi had a pretty good game too -- he just needed his teammates to step up (ahem, Eto'o). Give them credit. They kept playing and playing and playing. And when the equalizer finally came, I was hugging people I didn't know. I honestly celebrated like I scored. How perfect that it came from Iniesta's boot, the player who along with Xavi, represents all that is good and holy about Barcelona?

For a long time -- about 183 minutes to be precise -- this year's semifinal seemed like a torturous re-run of last year's. And then God, wearing red and blue no doubt, intervened. Commiserations to Chelsea and their fans, who frankly don't deserve the disgraceful thugs Drogba and Ballack to be representing them. Football can be cruel sometimes. But it can also be wholly blissful and joyous.

UPDATE: Looks like Iniesta too believes in the theory of destiny:

If it had been in the fifth minute I would have hit it into the stands but I struck it with my whole soul and it went in the only place it could.

UPDATE II: The Essien goal was basically a carbon copy of Zidane's famous goal against Bayer Leverkusen a few years ago, the only difference being Essien was about five yards further away.

UPDATE III: While we're talking about penalty shouts and the like, please have a look at this. Let's just say the refereeing was horrible and both teams were victimized, and leave it at that, shall we?