It’s the first liveblog of the year, commencing at roughly 3:30pmEST today and lasting through the end of the match, which starts at 4pmEST. Check out the preview here.
Lineups:
Athletic: Iraizoz, Iraola, Ocio, Ustaritz, Koi, Orbaiz, Gurpegui, Susaeta, Gabilondo, De Marcos, Llorente
Barça: Valdés, Alves, Puyol, Piqué, Abidal, The Yaya, Xavi, Keita, Pedro!, Henry, Bojan
You can follow my pre-game tweets here, which should include the lineups and some other “brain droppings”.
Another casualty by the seducing art of Hectorizing.
OK PEOPLE WHO HAVE Xs AND Zs IN THEIR NAMES PLEASE RAISE YOUR HANDS RIGHT NOW!!
So when does thing go active?
Copy pasting:
CP:
I do…its just that I’ve been sleeping at 3:00 AM quite often in the last two days.
Yeah the LiveBlog is a chat.Its great fun!! Too bad I’ll miss it (grrr im still not back in Europe).
The time zone is at the end of the preview.
Oh and do people still want to talk here? I know what Kxevin says about old threads not “dead” but thats for us cool people riiiiight?
And I think the LiveBlog starts one hour before the match.
Hey isaiah canyou please tell me where you find confirmed lineups. I always want to know lineups before games start and never can. Not only barcelona lineups any site which gives this information.
Thx in advance
Also when are they confirmed like an hour or so before the game?
…Damn it feel ur pain hector
2nd time in a row i get hectored elkavya but ill just move the question lol
Thanks for the reply. Today was such a boring day for football. Still utterly pissed with the Ajax – PSV match. Hopefully Barca do enough to cheer me up. Expecting Bojan and Pedro to start.
Achraf: Pep is an @$$, he keeps us waiting till the last hour (maximum delay) so just go the official site at about an hour before kick off or so and it should be fine.
PS: Good luck with being Hectored
CP: You didnt watch Aresnal – Everton?? or was that yesterday…
Ya you know with hector getting promoted into to tactical advisor and all they’re bound to be looking for a new victim to conspire against so everybody be warned. Kxev and Isaiah are on the search for the next hector.
Cp why pissed at ajax psv game it was a hell of an entertainer.
I really can’t wait to exercise my newly acquired power on a first victim. You guys will see next week
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CP, you are pissed with the Ajax-PSV match? I”m also pissed with it because it cost me 40 €. But I guess you’re a passionate Ajax fan, right? So that’s even worse, because passion is priceless. Are you dutch?
There’s another reason for me to be pissed, it is Arminia Bielefeld losing 3-2 against Koblenz after controlling the game for the first 80 min. (I’m from Bielefeld, Germany).
Plus, ManUtd won while Liverpool lost which is also against my will, so you are not alone with relying on Barca to save the weekend.
At least Arsenal strucked home a devastating win!
PS: Luis Suarez for upcoming World Striker. This guy has been amazing for at least 2 seasons, but I feel this one can surpass everything.
Oh, should add that Arminia was leading 2-0 until the 80th minute of play…
Damn you Hector, daaamn youuu!
*Shakes fist ala Hector pre-promoted*
any idea on the lineups yet?
LOL Helge
Poor Arminia.Conceded 3 goals in 10 mins
Arsenal match was very entertaining and yes, it was yesterday. I wonder if Ramzi or Hector watched it. Wenger’s tactics were impressive to say the least. Don’t care about the goals so much as half were Everton’s mistake but the dynamic forward line of Arsenal really impressed me. Even Bendtner looked pretty good.
Regarding Ajax. *sigh* What can I say? How many years has it been now with same bloody excuse? When are we going to get a f**king defense?! I don’t even feel like talking about it. It makes me sick.
PS My thoughts are with you Helge, I know you have suffered today. Are you expecting anything real from the season anymore?
Hey CP, how good/bad was Vermaelen with Ajax?
he looked excellent against Fellaini,Jo and co yesterday
the match is starting in about in hour…?
LiveBlog! LiveBlog! LiveBlog! LiveBlog!
This Fellani dude is pretty good apparently..I wouldn’t mind him.
Alas, I missed the Arsenal game but I had a good excuse (going to the beach)
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I did see some of them in preseason and Wenger finally breaking from his 4-4-2 dogma and going Barca style 4-3-3 (even admitting it!) seems poised to take the EPL by storm if early returns are an indication. If anybody has the personnel to pull that one off its Arsenal. That said, I cant talk much about this one game in particular because I did not watch it. They have to forward line to pull it off but are too thin at midfield IMO. If Fabregas goes down, they will have to switch to the older 4-4-2, he is the key to their new 4-3-3 like Xavi is to ours.
Anyways a nice thing I found today: http://pitchinvasion.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/la-liga-map.jpg
A 5.6% increase in attendances from last season. Quite contrary to what both Stannard and that idiot paul kept rambling about last season. Tells you why ignoring idiots rather than responding to them is so much better.
LINEUP!-
Valdés; Alves, Piqué, Puyol, Abidal; Xavi, Touré, keita, Pedro, Bojan, and Henry
@Arvind: He was Ajax’s best defender last season. I’m not sure if that’s a big thing anymore
Im at ease as long as the Yaya plays
This should be a good test to see how Pedro! does in filling in for Messi. Getting control of midfield is vital. Watchout for Susaeta since he has the characteristics to hurt us even more than Llorente who, although dominated by Pique in previous encounters, only needs one set piece or error to score.
I got the lineup 100% correct!!!!
Really Isaiah?!
Damn!
Is LiveBlog ready to roll?
Why are my posts not showing up? One is awaiting moderation and the other disappeared? WTH?
Hey Hector plz where did u get the lineups
Damn. Isaiah got it right!?!? Pep must be losing his touch
Achraf: http://www.sport.es and http://www.mundodeportivo.es (alas, in Spanish) are usually the first to post it.
It seems Isaiah is having some technical problems….no hurry.
Because you put a link in it, CP. We’re still working on the whole linking in comments thing.
Achraf, EMD has the goods as does Sport.
Ah, ok. I thought it was because I said ‘idiot’ lol. Anyways streams are out at myp2p and rojadirecta but the JustinTV ones are now useless.
do we know who’s on the bench yet?
Liveblog should be working now. JOIN OR DIE.
^
Wont be surprised if we concede off a set piece
Thanks CP.
Is Coveritlive ready? does not seem to be.
And brace yourselves, kids….Gamper isn’t on the telly, either.
titi is lame
kid is playing quite good though. have not seen lot of pedro till now. Bilbao have wisened up in the way they are marking Xavi. Makes it tough for us.
what a move…xavi missed absolute sitter. entire net and no defender within 3 yards. darn!
Is nobody else watching the match? So Bilbao lead 1 – 0. And based on the play, they kind of deserve it. Both the teams played well and before the goal, there were excellent chances on either end. The last 15 – 20 minutes was all Bilbao though. And the goal was lucky. If Alves had not interrupted, Valdes had it covered. Unfortunate but shit happens. Now for the second half.
On players front, I am not even sure if Pedro is in the field. Its been all Alves on right side. Hope he does come up in second half.
Mostly it has been excellent match and currently Bilbao are shading us. Its up to Pep now:). Hope we score at least a goal. Deficit of more then 2 and it will be difficult in return leg.
Pedro has been absent all because of Alves. Alves is ignoring the shit out of him on the right and just sending in pointless balls to the box. Ridiculous.
And Pedro has turned it up big time in second half. First an assist to Xavi and now a superb shot to score:).
Isaiah, it was 1:30 am start time here in Mumbai.. not 2:30 am.. thanx..
And mission accomplished. So we win 2 – 1 with goals from Xavi and Pedro. In the end, quite a match though the first half had more action then second. Team overall played quite well.
Second half was all cruise control. Bilbao did not make it easy but they also did not have any clear cut chances. We did score twice and had couple of other excellent opportunities.
Alves somehow manages to rile the opponents pretty much everytime. Today he was at it again making the last 15 minutes immensely vieweable:).
Considering everything, i think it was a 8/10 performance from the team.
I gotta say guys….I am loving me some Pedro! I think he has a great future ahead of him, even with all the competition he faces in the team. He looks like a truly gifted player. The assist for the first goal showed awareness, composure and very unselfish and the second goal was a sublime finish. All in all, great result, this was never going to be an easy game and I would have been very happy with a draw.
Alves is one evil bastard. I’m so glad he’s on our team now. We’ve got a ways to go to recover our best form though. Credit Caparros for throwing us some curve balls. The three man pressure on our CB’s when we were taking the ball out would be considered to risky by many but it worked damn well for the second half of the first half. We were just booting balls into the midfield and turning it into an EPL match. Xavi did not do well to adjust but after half time, Xavi came down more to help, we finally started seeing cross field switches and more one touch passing down the wings, and after the goal, it was pretty much gravy.
how bout Pedro! man of the match?
good start to the season – http://www.oleole.com/blogs/fcbnews/posts/athletic-bilbao-1-barca-2
Highlights! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8jwq8lbwrw
all credit to Bilbao, they kept our forward line from being very active, and you can say that all three starting strikers “disappeared” for long periods. but pedro made the most of his chances.
keita also seemed more active and involved than usual. i am liking him more and more.
wow hector, how’s that for instant gratification!
Keirrison didnt make the benfica bench for their league game today.