Comment: Barcelona Are A Team, Real Madrid Are Not Yet

Even the noble soul Marcus Brutus would have been moved. There were around 75,000 Real Madrid supporters inside the Bernabeu on Monday all worshipping Cristiano Ronaldo as the FIFA World Player of the Year and Ballon d'Or winner was unveiled amidst exotic circumstances. A handful of those were so overcome by the situation that they thought they could overcome the security and personally welcome the player to the biggest club in the world.

Ronaldo's official unveiling at the Bernabeu is yet another step in the start of Florentino Perez's neo-Galactico era. He is one of four signings that Madrid have made so far in the summer along with Kaka, Raul Albiol and Karim Benzema and Madrid have spent in excess of 200 million euros in the process of signing all these players. A couple or so Galacticos are expected to arrive before the start of the 2009-2010 campaign and then the ‘greatest team in football history’ would be constructed.

And that's the keyword: team. Because Real Madrid may be the biggest club in the world as well as the most successful and, as Monday night's gala showing attested, an indispensable entity to football; they may be assembling the best players in the world at the moment, they may have the monetary advantage over most other clubs, but they are not a team. At least, not yet; FC Barcelona are.

Everyone knows how Barcelona played last season and how they blew away almost everyone, becoming the first Spanish team to achieve the mythical treble, and won the Champions League in astounding fashion, ripping apart Europe's supposed best defence and forcing Europe's supposed best defender to look like a Titus Bramble. Barcelona's all-consuming, all-conquering, all-graceful football was something the world had not witnessed since the days of Real Madrid's Galacticos and even then the Zidanes, the Figos and the Ronaldos were not as overwhelming as Barcelona were.

The Catalans' football was as much an exhibition of teamwork as a demonstration of individual artistry; it was a lesson on how to add the individual parts to make a concrete and wholesome structure. Pep Guardiola balanced team ethics with on-pitch individual freedom, perfectly making Barcelona an unstoppable monster in 2008-2009.

To make Real Madrid an even bigger unstoppable monster in 2009-2010 Manuel Pellegrini would have to take a similar approach. Perhaps for the first time in his coaching career the Chilean, who weaved wonders at modest Villarreal and led them to Champions League semi-finals in their first ever season in Europe's top tier club competition, has a whole bunch of proven world class stars to work with and it is now on him to mould this assembly of players into a well functioning galactic football team.

Buying stars doesn't necessarily guarantee success and no one knows this better than Mr. Perez himself. At the turn of the century he attempted to construct the most frightening team in football history, collecting Luis Figo, Zinedine Zidane, Ronaldo, David Beckham, Michael Owen and Robinho, but that 'dream team' didn't last long as it fell apart at the seams. This time there is a more radical approach but with a degree of cautiousness; once bitten twice shy perhaps.

There is no reason why the likes of Kaka and Ronaldo and Benzema (and maybe Franck Ribery) cannot feature in the same starting xi. Zidane, Figo and Ronaldo (the Brazilian) did so not so long ago, didn't they? Yet it is easier said than done. Florentino Perez hasn't spent millions just to compete but to win and win in style. Madrid in 2009-2010 would be expected to win every competition they participate in, win with glamour and conviction and play better football than Barcelona. And all this right from day one.

Most would admit that Real Madrid as a team would require some time to gel and settle but can even a well settled, firing-in-all-cylinders Real Madrid side play better than Barcelona? Last season Messi, Iniesta, Xavi, Eto'o and co played the brand of football that even they, a well settled team of proven world class stars and Ballon d'Or contenders, could find difficult to emulate next term and for the Merengues to better that would take something special, very special.

Moreover, Barcelona need not make many changes to their line-up; maybe get a better left-back to replace Eric Abidal, and replace one-foot-out-of-the-Camp-Nou-cathedral and Manchester-bound Samuel Eto'o with David Villa and that would be it. As for Real Madrid, they are in the process of a squad overhaul and the shape of the line-up is going to change, at the back, in midfield and upfront. Barcelona already have a team chemistry and coherence among the players with a marvelous level of squad harmony too; Madrid have to create a team chemistry and coherence among the players along with squad harmony.

Former Real Madrid coach Juande Ramos summed up the situation perfectly when he said, "On an individual level and with regards to players I would say so (Madrid are now better than the treble-winning Barcelona), but Barcelona have the advantage of being a team, and Real Madrid do not have that yet. One must see what happens. Now is the time to put them in the shaker and see if the cocktail is good.”

Indeed, let us see if the cocktail is good.

Subhankar Mondal