The preparations
Wembley: one of the most iconic names in world football. Possibly the best final the game could have picked at that moment: featuring two contrasting ways of understanding the game, both competitive; two clubs that have paved the way in terms of academy development, of their drive, their philosophy. And two managers who share a mutual respect, reverence and competitive instinct towards each other.
Barcelona had just won their third consecutive league title, made all the more commendable because no other European league had witnessed the same winner as the previous season – for one simple reason: the 2010–11 campaign had started on the back of the World Cup in South Africa, which is more taxing for the bigger clubs that provide the best players. Incredible, then, that Barcelona had had eight of their players prominently involved with the winners, Spain.
For the Catalan club, winners in 2006 and 2009, it was their third Champions League final in six years, and that year they had also knocked out Real Madrid in a highly contentious semi-final. After just three seasons as first-team coach, Guardiola had won nine titles out of the twelve contested and could surpass Cruyff’s Dream Team by winning a second European Cup. In contrast, Manchester United, Champions League winners in 2008, had reached three finals in the previous four seasons, and had also just been crowned Premier League champions, their twelfth in nineteen years.
The numbers help set the scene: the two best clubs in recent history were clashing to decide who was the best in Europe. Both teams had won the European Cup three times; their head-to-head record was also equal – three wins apiece and four draws.
Pep Guardiola did not overlook the fact that Barcelona had built their legend in the modern era upon their first European Cup, secured in 1992 at the old Wembley stadium, and this proved to be a useful motivational tool deployed by him whenever the moment called for words of inspiration: whether whispered in a player’s ear on the way to warm-up, or while taking a breather and a gulp of water during a break in training, or written on a whiteboard in the dressing room before a match. The England cathedral of football was a place of special personal significance for Pep, where he had first laid his hands on the famous piece of silverware known as ‘Big Ears’ – also the day almost twenty years earlier where Pep Guardiola the player had counted the steps that led up to the balcony where they would be presented with the trophy.
The overall feeling of satisfaction of lifting the trophy as a manager surpassed anything Pep had felt when winning the European Cup as a player.
In the summer of 2010, at the beginning of that season, Pep knew that to reach the same heights of his first two years in charge, with the six consecutive titles in one calendar year,
would be impossible. Nevertheless, in order to overcome Manchester United in another European final, he would need to reinvent elements of his side, hence the decision to sign David Villa. Pep’s interest in bringing the Valencia striker to the Camp Nou first became an issue back in 2009 when, during the FIFA Confederations Cup in South Africa, Guardiola rang the player to tell him how much he wanted him at Barcelona and the role he saw for him at the Camp Nou. The move broke down amidst competition from Real Madrid and several Premier League clubs; but the fact that Pep had shown his faith in the Spanish international a year earlier played a huge part in the striker moving to the Catalan club in the summer of 2010.‘Pep is going to call you,’ Puyol told the forward. When Guardiola rings you to tell you he needs you, it’s impossible to be left in any doubt that his interest is genuine. David Villa will always be grateful to Pep for his persistence.
Having won the league three weeks previously, Villa, who had settled in extraordinarily well in his first season at the club, was one of the footballers rested during the last games of the domestic campaign – with an eye specifically on the Wembley showdown. ‘You will get to the final in great shape, trust me, David,’ Pep repeated to him in the preceding weeks. The manager knew that his eight World Cup finalists, and the Dutch midfielder Ibrahim Afellay, had not had a break from the game for a very long time – vital both physically and mentally. Pep would prepare for every eventuality and made the following promise to his players:
‘Lads, you’ve a commitment to the fans in reaching the final, but if you get us there, then I’m committed to making sure you win it.’
Guardiola was choosing his words carefully to sprinkle his customary gold dust on a season that was again turning out as astonishing as any other. But he was not sure how his fatigued side was going to react. The game was going to have the usual thorough analysis and preparation, but did the players have enough left in the tank to respond to the demands, physical and psychological?
Even Pep’s meticulous preparation and contingency plans could not have foreseen the freak circumstances that popped up unexpectedly days before the final and that required an immediate response.
The season before, a volcanic ash cloud from Iceland had drifted into European airspace, forcing Barcelona to frantically rearrange their plans and travel by road to a Champions League semi-final against Inter Milan, wrecking their pre-match preparations.
With an impending sense of déjà vu, the news broke that another Icelandic ash cloud, spreading from the Grimsvotn volcano, was heading towards England and might lead to all flights being suspended ahead of the Champions League final weekend. Pep and his staff reacted quickly. To avoid having their plans left in tatters at the last minute, the club decided to move their flight to London forward by two days from Thursday to Tuesday; giving them four days in England to focus on the final.
It may have been a blessing in disguise. The team stayed at the luxurious Grove Hotel and Spa in Hertfordshire and trained nearby at Arsenal’s London Colney facilities. The days spent in the relative seclusion of their base in the English countryside afforded them some vital R&R time as well as the opportunity to focus on the match, away from the pressures and constant media attention they would have been subjected to in Barcelona.
At that time, Eric Abidal was recuperating from the operation to remove a tumour from his liver he had undergone just two months earlier in March. There were doubts as to whether he would play again, and even the most optimistic club officials were speculating that he might return, at the very earliest, the following season. Instead, just under seven weeks later, Abidal featured in the last two minutes of Barcelona’s Champions League semi-final second-leg win over Real Madrid. As well as receiving the inevitable ovation from the Barcelona fans, Abidal’s team-mates rushed over to celebrate with him the moment the final whistle went, throwing him up in the air as if it were his birthday.
The player had his heart set on making the team for the Champions League final, even if Guardiola had warned ‘it will be difficult for Abidal to be 100 per cent fit’. Pep knew that the player’s body might not be ready for it, but had no doubts about how much he wanted to play. Another problem was the fact that Puyol was also not fully fit, so Javier Mascherano, a midfielder converted into a centre back, would have to play at the heart of the defence.
Alex Ferguson, with no injury worries, had practically two teams to choose from. And also time to prepare the match. For two years he had been saying he hoped to get the chance to face Barcelona again in a Champions League final because he knew what he had to do to beat them. His wish was granted. But, as they say, be careful what you wish for.
For starters, Ferguson felt that he’d got it wrong two years earlier, in Rome, when he kept his players isolated for too long in the build-up, locked away in a hotel with minimal contact with the outside world. To avoid making the same mistakes again, the United manager decided that he would give his players a break from the monotony of hotel life by taking them to see a West End show on the Thursday evening in London forty-eight hours before the Wembley final. Fergie’s choice of Jersey Boys, however, was not fully appreciated by his entire squad, some of whom joked that it might have been a good night out for someone of Sir Alex’s age, but not exactly the kind of night they might have had in mind if left to their own devices in the capital. The day before the big match involved plenty of last-minute arrangements, including a leisurely morning stroll in the capital and a training session at Wembley in the evening.
The United manager also wanted to get his tactics right as well and his preparations on the training pitch at Carrington had begun two weeks earlier. Ferguson spent a week drilling his players in the game plan at their Manchester HQ and took the opportunity to put them into practice in a trial run against Blackpool at Old Trafford on the last day of the Premier League season, a week before the final. It was the afternoon in which United collected the league trophy and Blackpool’s tearful and dejected players confirmed their relegation.
Ferguson instructed the United players to put pressure on Blackpool/Barcelona high up the field and, if the first line of pressure was beaten, to drop deep quickly and keep a narrow midfield, because he believed that his side could effectively surrender the wide areas to Barcelona, where they were relatively ineffectual. When Barcelona did get the ball into danger areas near the United box, the players were warned to be particularly mindful of quick one-twos.
The concept of maintaining and sustaining the pressure on the Barcelona defence also applied to free kicks, where the United players were told to hit the ball into the box at every opportunity.
They were also coached to get the ball forward early and transition quickly as soon as they recovered possession. If that meant hitting long balls, so be it, as the priority was to get the ball forward when the majority of Barcelona players were still in the United half. By getting the ball to Hernández at the earliest opportunity, he could exploit one v ones against the exposed defenders.
In other words, with possession limited in the face of Barcelona’s expected dominance of the ball, the United players were under strict orders to make every single opportunity count.
The tactical talk
For the Barcelona players in the Wembley changing room before kick-off, there was to be no epic, rousing, motivational film; just short, informative, tactical video clips. However, Guardiola’s pre-match chat was so intense, so precise, that there was no need for anything else. It began with the coach highlighting images from previous matches – focusing on moves and isolated incidents involving Manchester United – alongside reminders to his own team on how to defend and how to attack, but was cleverly transformed into a passionate, inspirational speech from Pep that lifted the team and gave them the confidence to believe in themselves. Villa revealed the following day that it was a pity there was no video recording of Pep’s performance in the dressing room that day, because it would make a very useful educational tool for any aspiring young coaches in how to give the perfect team talk.
No video doing the rounds on the internet, but, by listening to the footballers who were in the dressing room that evening, we are able to get an insight into what Pep told them before kick-off at Wembley.
Pep came into the room with his jacket off, rolled up his sleeves and began talking, pointing every now and again at an image on the screen. He looked into his players’ eyes, speaking with intent in fast, clear Spanish. Pacing around, gesturing furiously, spontaneously, he would occasionally move up close and address one of his pupils directly, to drive home his point.
‘I know we are going to be Champions, I have no doubt about it at all. Lads, I told you that you would take me to the final and that if you did that, I was going to make you win. If we do things how we are supposed to, then we will be the superior team.
‘Manchester United also like to keep the ball, want to take away our protagonism on the pitch. You know we are not used to not having much of the ball, so we must keep it. And if we take it off them, used as they are to having possession against other teams, they will be uncomfortable and struggle to defend.
‘Now, Eric [Abidal], have a look at this: Antonio Valencia always runs down the wing so you should play further up so Valencia feels less comfortable. Alvés, listen to me: Park prefers diagonal movements instead of vertical ones, so use the outer zones. United have recently started taking short corners, so remember what we have been doing specifically for this in training. It will be much better if United didn’t take a single corner today. And remember our own set piece that we have been practising all this week, we’ve not used it in a match for at least three games to keep it secret from United, so that means you can
surprise them with it.
‘You are going to be able to find and create space here and here. Right here. This is where the game can be won and lost. Keep an eye on the two v ones that are going to pop up here, here and here. In midfield we will be four against three, we’ll have superiority in numbers in these central areas. Here is where you are going to win the game for me. Because I have seen it, I have analysed it and I know this is where we will win it.’
So, it wasn’t the simple instructions that Cruyff gave his Barcelona players at Wembley twenty years earlier, no ‘go out and enjoy yourself’. The message was ‘yes, we have to enjoy this match, but we have to suffer for it too’.
Javier Mascherano cannot help being a fan of Pep, of the delivery and timing of his speeches, of the quality of the message: ‘I’ve heard more than one player say: “Son of a bitch, he’s nailed it!” That speech at Wembley was one that made the greatest impression on me. While he was talking, it wasn’t as if he was referring to a game that we were about to take part in, it was as if we were actually playing it right there. He was up and down, side to side in front of the board, gesticulating; and if you shut your eyes and listened to him, you were already out there in the middle of the action. Everything that he said would happen, happened as he said it would. During the match I was thinking; I’ve seen this already, I’ve already heard all about it – because Pep has already told me about it ...’
There was one more moment of inspiration. A few words that would send Mascherano, for one, out on to the pitch with a tear in his eye.
Just after the players had warmed up, minutes before the match was about to kick off, completely unplanned, Pep decided to appeal to the players’ human instincts. As the referee was trying to usher them out and into the tunnel leading on to the pitch, Pep quickly grabbed hold of them and gathering them around said, with pure determination in his voice:
‘Listen, lads, we’re going to do this for Abidal! He has made it here and is with us, we cannot let him down.’
Scouting report: Champions League Final Wembley 2011
First half:
Abidal was in the line-up.
Pep received a report from a friend in England that explained Manchester United had been training with a 4-3-3 but that finally they were going to play with their more usual 4-2-
3-1: a formation that could convert into 4-4-1-1. ‘Are you sure?’ Pep had to ask till he was convinced. Barcelona came out with their classical 4-3-3.
The report from his friend was spot-on.
In the first ten minutes, Manchester United applied lots of pressure and intensity with man-to-man marking in midfield. Rooney stuck close to Busquets to prevent Barcelona building from the back, through him. Giggs was all over Xavi. Barcelona struggled as they couldn’t find superiority in any part of the pitch and the game was in the hands of United.
After ten minutes, the first of two key moves of that final took place.
Xavi dropped a little deeper, to receive the ball in line with where Busquets would normally start. It meant that Barcelona effectively switched to a 4-2-3-1. United didn’t feel brave enough to send any player to mark Xavi that high upfield – and if they did, they reacted too late. It enabled Xavi to see more of the ball, in space – allowing him to play with his head up, under little pressure, pick his passes and start dictating the game from deep. It was a good move; but it did mean that Barcelona’s superiority was taking place a little deeper than they might have wished.
And then another tactical move changed everything.
Messi started to see more of the ball in midfield. He moved from his position higher up, in between the lines, to a midfield area where neither Vidić nor Ferdinand followed for fear of straying too far from their centre-back positions.
It effectively meant that the midfield was shaping up as Busquets, Xavi, Iniesta and Messi against Rooney, Carrick and Giggs.
From that moment on, Barcelona had control of the game. They scored in the twenty- seventh minute to make it 1-0. Rooney, however, pulled United level five minutes later and