Barcelona travel to San Sebastian on Sunday night and the two men in the dugouts, Luis Enrique and David Moyes, hold two of the toughest jobs in Spanish football.
Both come with different types of pressures and it means that the clash at Anoeta will be a tense affair.
Whenever Barcelona play, the eyes of the world are upon them. This game will be intensely scrutinised, however, because former Manchester United boss Moyes is facing his toughest test so far in Spanish football.
This is the first time that his team have come up against one of Spain's top sides since he took the reins.
Of course, on paper, the Barcelona job is significantly tougher than the Real Sociedad job.
Nobody expects the Basque side to do much else than ruffle a few feathers when the league's giants come to visit, and maybe make a bid for a European place.
Barcelona, on the other hand, are always in contention for the title and are enveloped in a never-ending and eternal struggle against Real Madrid.
However, judged purely on a case-by-case basis, both Enrique and Moyes find themselves in tough positions.
Let's start with the Scot. He doesn't speak Spanish, which already makes his job a whole lot tougher.
A couple players in the Real Sociedad squad can speak English, while other players are brushing up on it. Moyes, for his part, is going to try and learn Spanish.
This will take a while though, and it may be some time before he can get his points across clearly.
They say the language of football is universal, but there will still be plenty of moments of linguistic-related confusion.
Moyes also has to find a way to make his team less dependent on the talented striker Carlos Vela. Only one of the five league goals they have scored under Moyes has not come from the Mexican.
While there's nothing wrong with having a star player, what Moyes needs to do is not change the identity of the goalscorer, but coax more goals in total out of his team.
In seven games in La Liga and the Copa del Rey, Moyes' team have only scored in four, with four draws, two wins and a defeat.
Of course, recovering from the mess Jagoba Arrasate left the squad in will take some time, given the low confidence levels around the place.
So as well as his own battles with the language and culture, Moyes also has plenty of work to do with his team.
Enrique, on the other hand, has none of the acclimatisation struggles that Moyes faces. He played at Barcelona for several years and is used to the pressure that being at such a club entails. Enrique also managed the B team and knows the club inside out.
Enrique has other troubles, though. The FIFA transfer ban means he's stuck with his current squad until January 2016.
Thanks to some less-than-efficient work in the transfer market, he's short in a couple of places and will need to turn to the fresh-faced but talented youngsters in La Masia to fill some gaps.
In theory he could be left with no right-backs apart from Douglas, if Dani Alves' contract is not renewed and Martin Montoya forces his way out.
However, these problems are longer-term issues. Right now, Enrique is struggling with getting his team to move on from the football of years past.
He's not trying to change Barcelona's style completely and turn them into a counter-attacking outfit, but the power now lies in the attack rather than the midfield and he needs to find a way to reflect that in Barcelona's play.
Enrique doesn't seem to have settled on a starting line-up, not a tactical system. He's always tweaking.
That's fine and it will take time for him to get Barcelona playing at their optimum. Standing still in football is never a good idea anyway.
But the pressure for instant results has never been higher at the club, who in Luis Suarez, Lionel Messi and Neymar have either the best or second best front line in world football.
If a team with that strike force goes to Anoeta on Sunday night and doesn't find the net, questions will be asked.
And unfortunately for Enrique, locking Barcelona out will be the main objective for Moyes on Sunday, with a point something that would suit the Scot, if he could take it now.
0 comments:
Post a Comment