Messi and Beautiful

May 4, 2011 11:18 AM

Barcelona may or may not be the greatest soccer team of all time, as some now claim, but watching them is one of the prime viewing pleasures of our sports era. Can it get any better?. SLYT.
posted by ecourbanist (36 comments total)

Put you big pants on!!
posted by humboldt32 at 11:20 AM on May 4, 2011

gah, *your*
posted by humboldt32 at 11:20 AM on May 4, 2011

Are you implying the animation is better than the real thing? Or what? I don't get the point of this post.
posted by tommasz at 11:25 AM on May 4, 2011

The second Messi goal from the first leg of the semis was astonishing. Running at the defense at like that at the end of the game and still thing them in knots.
posted by carter at 11:26 AM on May 4, 2011

thing/tying ...
posted by carter at 11:26 AM on May 4, 2011

Yeah, Messi is good at football. But watching Barcelona can be as tedious as it is inspiring.
posted by MetalFingerz at 11:28 AM on May 4, 2011

here ...
posted by carter at 11:30 AM on May 4, 2011

Multi talented. Their football is as good as their diving.
posted by adamvasco at 11:36 AM on May 4, 2011

When did Barca beat Real 5-0 ...?
posted by mrgrimm at 11:40 AM on May 4, 2011

Oh hey, it's Richard Swarbrick. Previously on Metafilter, where in that instance the object of adulation was Gareth Bale tearing Milan to shreds.

These animations which reduce football to its two essential parts: the players and the ball. Ultimately, take away the mind games, and the diving, and the off-field blather, and that's what the game really is about.

On Hating Barcelona. Not to say that Barcelona isn't a terribly good team, of course, and hailed by so-called 'purists', but there's a team for everyone, and Barcelona isn't everyone's team.

mrgrimm - is that a rhetorical question? If not, they did it earlier this season, in late November, handing Mourinho's Madrid their first defeat of the season. Barcelona had been accustomed to beating their rivals on a regular basis, but 5-0 is really quite something. That said, Mourinho then halted Pep's 5-game winning streak over Madrid in the very next El Clasico, so he must have learned something from that drubbing.
posted by WalterMitty at 11:45 AM on May 4, 2011 [2 favorites]

Love the animation style. Thanks for posting.
posted by Corduroy at 11:53 AM on May 4, 2011

Thanks, WalterMitty. It was indeed an honest question. I follow the game extremely casually.
posted by mrgrimm at 11:55 AM on May 4, 2011

Just when you thought a Messi goal couldn't get any prettier.
posted by Aizkolari at 11:56 AM on May 4, 2011

(I saw the final was 9-3 so there had to be a doozy in there ...)
posted by mrgrimm at 11:57 AM on May 4, 2011

Here's a good article on the significance of Barcelona and Real Madrid, for persons not into soccer. It's by Brian Phillips, who's pretty perceptive about the sport. Good writer.

A piece about the recent Barca-Madrid series.

His archive at Slate.
posted by Zerowensboring at 12:05 PM on May 4, 2011 [2 favorites]

Love this, and loved the Bale one previously. Keep them coming. Messi is nothing short of magical and I could watch him all day long - live action or animated.
posted by stennieville at 12:12 PM on May 4, 2011 [1 favorite]

thereisdennisbergkamp...

...and one of the greatest goals in the history of football.
posted by lemuring at 12:14 PM on May 4, 2011 [3 favorites]

Lovely illustrations.

I can picture myself in a club in Ibiza dancing to this.
posted by stargell at 12:26 PM on May 4, 2011

STAY THE FUCK AWAY FROM CESC!
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 12:34 PM on May 4, 2011 [3 favorites]

I love watching "El Clasico" but it seems like it's always the same 2 commentators and one of them, Tommy Smyth to be exact, drives me fucking insane. He's so irritating he makes we want to punch the TV within 30 seconds of having to listen to him. Grar. I wish there was an audio filter that could just remove his voice... it seems like it's distinct enough for that.
posted by Hairy Lobster at 12:54 PM on May 4, 2011

Being a soccer fan is as frustrating as it is rewarding. For every 40-yard sprint of excellence, there's 60-70 minutes of tedium, where the halfback passes to the middie who passes to the fullback who passes to the goalie. I love soccer and even i find it absurdly boring at times. The fact that this tedium is only broken up by the sight of a player writhing in pain from a glancing blow to the side of his foot? Made only bearable when its your team's player in the opposition's penalty area. And don't even get me started on the sorry state of officiating these days (one person to ref an entire game? I mean c'mon, tennis has like 18 different officials, and you can even call one in whose sole purpose is to touch the netcord during services to make sure lets' are called correctly). And then if you do see a goal, there's hardly anybody around to celebrate with, because nobody else in america cares. "Well, that's great. Who's messy and why does nobody clean him up?" Add in the fact that I'm an Arsenal fan (think Buffalo Bills, circa 1990) with no one to commiserate with except Stan Kroeke, and you can see why I give up on soccer almost weekly.

But I still watch, every week, eyes peeled, hand to mouth, legs jittering up and down. Because there's that one second, that one moment of brilliance, where you think, "Ah, yes. This is why." And you smile, and all is good.
posted by wayofthedodo at 1:01 PM on May 4, 2011 [6 favorites]

Wow, the reduction of the game to just those simple elements only emphasizes how amazing Messi is. I feel for Iker Casillas who's reduced to a Grendel-like green glob taking a constant whupping.

Thanks, lemuring: youtube had deleted the copy of that I favorited a while back. Whenever I'm feeling a little down or the day just won't get started, I fire that up and start yelling, "DENNISBERGKAMP! DENNISBERGKAMP! DENNISBERGKAMP! DENNISBERGKAMP!"
posted by yerfatma at 1:37 PM on May 4, 2011 [1 favorite]

...and one of the greatest goals in the history of football.

Maybe the greatest World Cup goal ever. Part of what's so amazing about it is how workmanlike it was. But that was Bergkamp. See another amazing variation that looks downright quotidian.

My personal favorites for Bergkamp are when he curls the ball perfectly into the top right corner. Unstoppable off the corner kick. Just unstoppable.

For the '98 WC, I was working with @Home Benelux, and the Dutch guys were in town for that game. If you thought the announcer went nuts, you should have heard those 60-year-old Dutch guys howl.

Whenever I'm feeling a little down or the day just won't get started, I fire that up and start yelling, "DENNISBERGKAMP! DENNISBERGKAMP! DENNISBERGKAMP! DENNISBERGKAMP!"

Here is the video you are looking for.
posted by mrgrimm at 2:01 PM on May 4, 2011 [2 favorites]

As a Barcelona supporter living in Madrid, today has been an interesting day to say the least; you could hear the whole city whine over the ref, but hardly anybody conceded that barça was great and truly deserved to win. Did you know that in Spain, Real Madrid's nickname is "The Gentleman Club"? not anymore apparently.

Anyway, Messi has many qualities and the one I like best about him is his humility, he never talks about who's the best or second best, he always talks in terms of "the team". And rightly so, Barcelona needs Messi as much as Messi needs Barcelona. It's a pity that sometimes people forget about brilliant players like Iniesta, Xavi or Valdés, who have redefined the roles of their respective positions. But as Guardiola jokingly said when asked about his tactics: "balones a Messi" (pass the ball to Messi)
posted by valdesm at 2:39 PM on May 4, 2011 [1 favorite]

Messi is a genius, and potentially one of the best players ever, no doubt about it, but the Barcelona v Real Madrid Champions League semi final epitomised everything that's bad about modern football, not what's great. The blatant diving, cheating, intimidation of the referee, histrionics, whining, bad sportsmanship, allegations of bias and negative tactics left a very sour taste in the mouth, regardless of the obvious quality of the players on the pitch. As for this current Barcelona team being the best ever, I think anyone who saw the Busby Babes in action, or Cruyff's Ajax side of the early seventies or the Real Madrid team with Ferenc Puskas, Alfredo di Stefano and Francisco Gentowhich which won the first five European cups straight would have grounds to disagree.
posted by joannemullen at 3:03 PM on May 4, 2011 [1 favorite]

Here is the video you are looking for.

Highest rated comment: "THERE IS BEAR CUM! THERE IS BEAR CUM! THERE IS BEAR CUM! THERE IS BEAR CUM! THERE IS BEAR CUM! THERE IS BEAR CUM! THERE IS BEAR CUM! THERE IS BEAR CUM! THERE IS BEAR CUM!"
posted by williampratt at 4:24 PM on May 4, 2011 [1 favorite]

What? This thread is about sport?

Football/soccer is a wonderful sport, and the animation is beautiful, but the music in that video is sublime.
posted by malocchio at 5:01 PM on May 4, 2011

As a Barcelona supporter living in Madrid, today has been an interesting day to say the least; you could hear the whole city whine over the ref, but hardly anybody conceded that barça was great and truly deserved to win. Did you know that in Spain, Real Madrid's nickname is "The Gentleman Club"? not anymore apparently.

Certainly Barcelona is a very good team, and in any discussion about the best ever teams, they'll be right there in the mix, but their diving and histronics also certainly mar their game. (Hello, Pedro.) Cheating's a part of football, but if we're going to subscribe to the narrative of eleven players vs. eleven players and a ball, then we have to condemn cheating in the game in any form, and Barcelona, being an exemplar of the finest forms of passing football, have a moral duty to at least not cheat so mindblowingly blatantly.

Why do we hate it when Barcelona cheats? Is it because we expect them to be angels? No doubt that's part of it, but I'd argue that it's because they aren't really good at it, not the way we expect them to be so very good at it, given their clear superiority in so many other footballing techniques. Instead they seem very mid-table La Liga when they're cheating and diving. Partly it's because we wonder, are they really that good if they have to cheat? Our faith is shaken, at least until the next time Messi skins thirteen opposing players and a bemused coach to dump the ball into his opponent's net.
posted by WalterMitty at 5:26 PM on May 4, 2011 [2 favorites]

I don't know from futbol, but that was one damn fine video.
posted by caddis at 8:43 PM on May 4, 2011

It's a strange thing, being a football fan. Barcelona's dominance and lack of humility causes me to look forward to the day when Real Madrid overtakes them once again. Real Madrid, the team of fascists everywhere. Real Madrid, coached by the perfect antithesis of sporting glory.

But they're also the Real Madrid, as joannemullen mentions, of di Stefano and Puskas, of that goal by Zidane which is for my money the finest goal in football, so I don't feel too bad.

So now I'm hijacking the thread. The game is this: choose your world XI, with two caveats: you must have at least three defenders, and you may only have one player from any given country. Go.
posted by Errant at 10:01 PM on May 4, 2011

I don't know from futbol, but that was one damn fine video.

Reiterating and amplifying this. Have to assume it's no accident, given that it's Catalonia's finest being celebrated, that it reminded me instantly of Miro.
posted by gompa at 10:11 PM on May 4, 2011

Real Madrid, coached by the perfect antithesis of sporting glory.

Whut?

According to Wikipedia, Mourinho has coached in 506 games, won 344, lost 102 and tied 60. His teams have scored 560 more goals than they've suffered (scored 928, suffered 368).

Maybe you meant apotheosis not antithesis?
posted by chavenet at 3:14 AM on May 5, 2011

(S)He said "sporting", not "winning".
posted by salmacis at 5:57 AM on May 5, 2011

Yeah, Mourinho is the greatest douchebag I have ever seen.
posted by Pendragon at 6:46 AM on May 5, 2011

re: Barcelona diving, and I'm speculating here, I've noticed that they tune down their theatrics when playing against proper football. And I mean teams that stop them by defending well, even if defending with 10. On the other hand, if the other team abuses the spirit of the game with constant fouling, theatrics appears. I'm not trying to excuse their histrionics here, but many times the opponent walks away without a warning, so next time they exaggerate. And I mean exaggerate, not dive. Thing is, they might not have been fouled in the face, but they've been fouled. On the other hand, last game against Madrid, more than one player shouldn't have finished the game, like Lassa or Carvalho. But they did.

Bottom line is refereeing is hard, refs make mistakes, and theatrics or violent fouls don't help at all.
posted by valdesm at 8:31 AM on May 5, 2011 [1 favorite]

As far as diving/exaggeration is concerned, I just see it as part of the game, just don't fucking do this, you idiot.
posted by d1rge at 10:13 AM on May 5, 2011