What do you call the Barcelona style of play? It's call Tiki Taka football, which more or less means touch-touch. The tiki taka style of play is characterized by possessing the ball for large portions of the game, moving the ball quickly from one player to the next and in and out of the opponent, breaking them down with short passes. It is a huge game of keep away, with the other team acting as the piggy in the middle.
Actually, the idea is to always keep the ball away from your opponent and then to deliever that killer ball to score a goal.
The killer pass is the through ball in behind the defense, just as the other team is lulled to sleep and worn out from chasing the ball all around the pitch all game long. Or, some players can get so frustrated chasing Barcelona around on the pitch that they erupt in anger, as Cristiano Ronaldo does many times when he has to chase Barcelona players around the pitch.
And this is the way the game of soccer (football) is supposed to be played. The style of play that both Barcelona and Spain play like nobody else in the world, perhaps even better than Brazil. The tiki taka style of play has enabled Barcelona to win numerous La Liga trophies and the Champions League. And then Spain of course just won the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
Barcelona make the tiki taka style of play look easy, but it's really not. It requires that all the players on the team have the same understanding of the game, are on the same page, and always moving for one another off the ball.
It also requires that every player has exceptional touch on the ball. If the players don't have the touch, they can't make those short passes, usually with just one touch, and pull off those quick give and goes to escape from pressure and find space.
Of course it also helps if you have very skillful players, like Xavi, Iniesta, Messi, and so on.
And here's another video of Barcelona setting up those little triangles and making those clever passes as they slice and dice through opposing teams, this time the victim is none other than their arch enemy, Real Madrid.
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