Barcelona's Carles Puyol dedicates Club World Cup win to David Villa & Ibrahim Afellay

The 33-year-old has expressed his delight with his side's comfortable win over Santos and said the victory was for two of his team-mates who were absent through injury

18 Dec 2011 15:30:00

By Stefan Coerts

More On :  , Barcelona, Ibrahim Afellay, David Villa, Carles Puyol
Barcelona x Santos (Shaun Boterill/FIFA)
Shaun Boterill/FIFA
Barcelona captain Carles Puyol has dedicated his side's 4-0 Club World Cup final win over Santos to injured team-mates David Villa and Ibrahim Afellay.
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Lionel Messi led the Catalans with a brace while Xavi and Cesc Fabregas chipped in with a goal apiece to secure a comfortable win.

After the game, Puyol told Telecinco TV: "We dedicate this title to those who are not here in Japan due to injury. We are even stronger with them and I want to dedicate this victory to them."

The 33-year-old went on to say that Santos were unable to cope his side's attacking verve and praised the work done to keep Brazilian starlet Neymar quiet throughout.

He continued: "We came out with great intensity and found the net pretty early on. That really gave us peace of mind and helped a lot.

"We never had any doubts about ourselves. We are always working hard to improve. We put in a very intense performance and that troubled Santos.

"The pace of the game in Brazil is much slower and they were surprised by our approach.

"We were wary of Neymar ahead of the game after analysing him, but we managed to keep him quiet and stop him."

Barcelona will now turn their attention to domestic action again as L'Hospitalet await on December 22 in the Copa del Rey.

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