Barcelona Evolution Means Stopping Lionel Messi Might Not Be Enough for Juventus

How on earth do you stop Lionel Messi?

Last Saturday’s Copa del Rey final, during which he spun away from three Athletic Bilbao players who were surrounding him and then jinked through three more challenges before slamming the ball in the bottom corner, suggested that perhaps you simply can’t.

But if Juventus are to spring a shock and win the Champions League, they have to find a way to limit Messi in Berlin on Saturday evening. Or rather, to outline the full scope of the difficulty, they must do so while also keeping Luis Suarez and Neymar in check.

Before the semi-final, Bayern Munich coach Pep Guardiola said that it was essentially impossible to defend against Messi. His response in that regard was logical: He decided to deal with Barca's lethal front three man-to-man and pack men in midfield, pressing high up the pitch. The move was widely criticised. Jamie Redknapp of Sky Sports called it “suicidal,” but the gamble made a certain kind of sense.

Barca, Guardiola seems to have reasoned, aren’t used to being pressed—and perhaps he recalled how his Barca side had struggled against Marcelo Bielsa’s hard-pressing Athletic—so if he could pack the midfield and pressure the ball early, perhaps his Bayern team could cut off the supply to that vaunted front line.

Rational or not, the move didn’t work, and Guardiola was forced to change tack after 15 minutes of the first leg. It turns out that Barca weren’t flustered by being pressed. Ivan Rakitic and Andres Iniesta delighted in sliding passes into the space behind the Bayern line for Messi, Neymar and Suarez to charge onto.

Bayern dropped deeper after that, and despite controlling possession (stats from WhoScored.com show they had 55 percent of the ball in the first leg), they were still beaten 3-0.

Juve simply don’t have the quality on the ball to dominate possession, so their only option is to drop deep, pack men behind the ball and look to make everything as congested in their defensive third as possible. Carlos Tevez and Alvaro Morata are ideally suited to the front-running roles, waiting for a counter.

It’s a ploy that worked for Internazionale against Barcelona in the semi-final in 2010 and for Chelsea against them at the same stage in 2012, but this is a Barca that has evolved since then.

Mario Carlini / Iguana Press/Getty Images

This Barca may not be quite as pure a manifestation of the Total Football ideal implanted at the club by Rinus Michels and Johan Cruyff, but it may also be less prone to frustrated caused by packed defences.

The front three of Messi, Suarez and Neymar all dribble—and are encouraged to do so—far more than the Barca front three of Guardiola’s final season back in 2011-12. Back then, Messi, Pedro and Alexis Sanchez completed an average of 4.3 dribbles per game in the Champions League. In this season's European competition, Messi, Neymar and Suarez have completed between them an average of 12 dribbles per game, per WhoScored.com.

Manu Fernandez/Associated Press

When faced with defensive cover, rather than trying to pass their way into space, Barca now have the capacity to beat the defender with a trick. Each member of the front three can take two or three defenders out of the game in an instant with a moment of individual brilliance, which in turn makes them extremely hard to stop as a collective.

Two banks of four—the traditional way to bed in and hang on—isn’t enough when that could become two banks of three at any moment, as one player’s individual skill creates space for others.

That’s without even mentioning the fact that with Juve likely to play a flattened diamond shape in midfield, Barca’s two full-backs, Dani Alves and Jordi Alba, can push on and overlap almost whenever they feel like it. And that’s the real problem: Even if you do find a way to stop Messi, it doesn’t mean you’ve stopped Barca.