When Barcelona
travel to Celtic tomorrow in the second round of matches of the group stage of
the Champions League, this confrontation will be a new test and a good force
the Catalans and the performance of
Argentine coach Gerardo Martino, in the absence of his compatriot Lionel Messi
striker best of his stars.
And the captain
of Argentina Messi will miss for three weeks after renewed his injury in the
muscle in the right leg during the match against Almeria on Saturday, which
ended in victory for Barcelona 2 - zero to be the eighth time that Messi
exposed to the injured in the same place among the 11 injuries he suffered
throughout his career so far.
The director of
football in Barcelona club Andoni Zubizarreta said on Monday, "It's not
easy to play without the best player in the world, but the team includes a
group of talented players and therefore to run the games with available players
it has."
The match in
Glasgow tomorrow represents a good test for Barcelona, especially since it lost
forth against this team in this stadium 1-2 in the group stage of the
tournament last season after Barcelona won 2-1 back at home.
The game comes
amid a great start for Barcelona in the Spanish league where team achieved win
over all seven games it played by the Spanish league since the start of the
current season to achieve this record and sits on top on goal difference, just
ahead of Atletico Madrid.
With the absence
of Messi because of the injury, the team will need to make some adjustments in
its ranks, and perhaps Neymar moves from playing in the left side of the attack
to the heart attack, or to remain in the left side and leaves the opportunity to
participate Cesc Fabregas in the heart of the defense as a non-striker
outright.
At the same time,
Martino will depend again on Gerard Pique and Mark Bartra, in the center of
defense due to the continued absence of Captain Carlos Puyol and fellow Argentine
Javier Mascherano to injuries.
And Celtic is
fighting a game with no problems in its ranks, is also aware that the win over
Barcelona is not impossible after it succeeded in this past season.
And what supports
the morale of Celtic is that the team in the current period presents a
wonderful show in addition to performances shine striker Georgios Samaras, who
scored three goals (a hat trick) in the last game of the Scottish League team.
Celtic began his
career at this season's Champions League defeat zero / 2 in front of Milan, but
the match was very equal between the two teams as opposed to what the result
shows that ended with them making confrontation with Celtic a great test of the
capacity of Barcelona and Martino in the absence of Messi.
The importance of
the match Compounded by the enormous public support enjoyed by Celtic at home
in such difficult confrontations and powerful addition to Barcelona's desire to
take revenge for his defeat at this stadium last season.
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