More Than Just The Cantera

There has been a lot of talk over the last couple of years on how FC Barcelona is a model club in that they have built a champion football team primarily through youth products with the occasional astute signings. While it is certainly true that La Masia is currently the leading youth academy in the world which includes not just the players currently playing in the club, but others like Fabregas, Arteta and Capel who are enriching other teams and leagues as well. However, it is a bit of an stretch to hold a moral high ground solely on the basis of how many youth products are in the first team and frankly unfair on the Ronaldinhos and Eto'os who came to the club and became legends by their own right. It is also a stretch to declare that this has always been the Barca philosophy.

Not the complete story

Youth systems go through their own golden periods where by a mixture of coincidence and a good system a bunch of talented players come together at once. Barca is having one now, in the 90s it was Ajax and Manchester United, in the 80s Real Madrid's five title winning team was built on a spine of home grown players. Before the rules regarding foreign players were relaxed, every team was anyway dependent on its youth products and the occasional foreign star.

While it is true that to preserve the Catalan identity of the club there has always been an emphasis on having Catalans playing for the club and this invariably means a healthy focus on the youth academy, it is not like Barca has always been a flagbearer in having teams which are solely dependent on home grown players. The Dream Team and throughout the 90s there were more than a fair share of first teamers who were bought from outside. If one remembers the sorry Gaspart era, Barca had a Madrid spending policy, except without the titles (brr). In recent history, the focus on youth products was only intensified in the later stages of Rijkaard and of course Guardiola eras of which the fruit is being reaped now.

While it is heartening and certainly a source of pride that the sextuple was truly won by a team which was mostly built from ground up, it should be remembered that a lot of this is down to the good fortune that players like Xavi, Iniesta and Messi have come together at once instead of ten years apart. I am more proud of the fact that no matter who is coaching or where the players come from, our attacking philosphy which was defined by Cruyff has remained steadfast and all the players from Messi to Oleguer have to accede to it. That philosophy is what really defines Barca, not how many youth products started the CL final. And that is why I support the club.

I Am Youuuu!

An old Youtube classic. If you haven't seen it, shame on you. Watch it now. If have seen it, you know you want to see it again.



Heh. Clone baby gets me everytime.

Some Things Don't Change, Even When They Do - Delhi

Hello, my fictional readership. You must be wondering about the reason of my long absence. It's just my last post was my 42nd and the Hitchhiker in me couldn't resist keeping it that way.
Not really, I've just been too lazy, no other excuses.
Hell, why do I need an excuse? It's my blog, I can be as frequent as I want to in updating it. You're not the boss of me. Especially since you don't exist.

...

Well, that was fun. Anyway, the subject of this post is my long overdue return to Delhi, the city I lived in for three years and left in 2001. It would be an understatement to say that the city I left doesn't exist anymore. When I left, Dhaula Kuan was still a circle, now it's a mess of flyovers. I was so disoriented I went past my school and only realised it at the last moment. And that was just the beginning, the city has changed enormously in the span of a decade and some parts are pretty much unrecognisable. A lot of the changes are good, the roads have become wider, the Metro is a godsend, the booze is cheaper than Bangalore. But for someone who expected a little more familiarity, this has been unnerving. Still, I was able to orient myself after a week and now I am comfortable with it.

Of course, some things never change. Old Delhi is still the same, with its narrow busy roads and delicious cheap food (or diarrhoea if you don't know where to look for it). The corridors of power remain pristine. Outer CP has the same charm even though the inner circle has changed face completely. And the heartbeat of the city ticks the same way, Delhi was, is and always will be a city of people who are show offs and ill-tempered, but at the same time go the extra mile in helping you. And it is the people who really make the city after all, they breathe life into the facade.

I am more than two weeks into my stay now, and although I would have liked to travel around a it more by now, it's been an enjoyable stay. I wouldn't mind working here if the opportunity would arise. I find that I still like the city.

Except for the part where my phone got stolen. Sucks.

Omnia mutantur, nihil inherit.

Comeback of (Out of) Sorts

It's 7:30 am. I haven't slept all night.

In fact, I've slept three hours in the last three days because I've been working on my moot memorials (which just got submitted, fingers crossed). Now I can do with sleep deprivation better than most people, but this is really, pushing it.

No point in going to sleep now, I'll miss class. Speaking of which, first two hours is the attendance cutting marching maniac, super-Nagarathna Saibaba. And she hates me. So I can't afford to sleep for the first two hours.

It's a perfect recipe for disaster.

Might as well go shave and remove the two week old itchy-scratchy beard. If I am found death with a pool of blood coagulating around my throat, please note that it wasn't a suicide attempt. I probably dozed off and used the razor as something to lean on.

... Forever

My voice is almost gone.
I have never drank so much as I have in the last four days.
I have never mixed drinks this much and all this is giving me frequent bouts of nausea.
My legs have buckled innumerable times in the last few hours after three days of standing in the sun.
I have worn the same pair of three-quarters for the last three days even though they have obtained layers of dust by now.

Strawberry Fields...

A Moving Snapshot of India

It was roughly 8:30 am when I woke up in the train. My sleep had been fitful, mostly because of the loudmouthed passenger below and I would have ideally liked to sleep more, but the attendant with the pre-ordered breakfast was prodding me. Grumbling and mumbling (as I do every morning till I wash my face), I accepted it and did the morning’s business.

After breakfast, I needed a break from the stuffy compartment so I went to the train door, opened it and looked outside. Luckily, the weather was brilliant and breezy, and I had one of my most refreshing experiences in a while.

I wonder if you have noticed it, but there’s always a reassuring similarity in the moving scenery outside a train wherever it may be in the Indian plains. There is always farm land; it seemed to be paddy fields rushing past me this time. Clearly the area had been blessed with good rain, because the artificially scooped little canals for catching and transporting rainwater were full in complete muddy brown glory. Now and then a little village would whiz by and the children who were playing with their deflated tires and crude dolls would look up and stare; this being a universal instinct all kids share, no matter how many trains pass them in a day. There were several fruit orchards among the fields, something which has always unnerved me. There’s just something weird about full grown trees arranged in neat, little rows and columns, it deviates too much from nature’s chaos for my liking.

I was pretty lost in thought admiring these sights which we city folk take as mundane but in reality get the opportunity to experience rarely. I wondered what it would be like to live such simple lives in agriculture based villages and oddly resented them for having such clear priorities, pleasures and pains. Of course, a farmer’s life is by no means rosy, but then very few lives in general are. Still, it must be much more satisfying and refreshing to take a bath in a river or lake after a hot day’s work then in a shower or bucket. I remember how relaxing the river bath in Hampi was.

I was peering out and looking ahead when I noticed that the train was running smack into a storm. It was a good one too. Within no time, my exposed hands on the door handles were getting hit by the raindrops, and each of them hurt like a bee sting. I weathered it for about ten minutes but then beat a hasty retreat to my berth and under my warm blanket. I hadn’t carried my watch or phone with me so I didn’t know how much time I had spent outside. I had judged it to be a half an hour at the most till I checked my watch. I had spent close to one and a half hours looking outside.

The Tragical Comedy of Beach Ball 1 - 0 Liverpool

Every now and then, the EPL gets down from its straitjacketed stiff-upper-lip pedestal and delivers a truly farcical moment. These moments have become quite prevalent this season and are making otherwise academic title chases quite interesting, but have so far have been mostly limited to managerial rants and antics off the pitch. Today's Sunderland 1-0 win over Liverpool provided a rare moment on it.


The sole goal came when the shot deflected off a beach ball lying on the six yard line and pretty much mindf*cked Pepe Reina who couldn't decide whether to go after the football or the giant red balloon. For the record, he chose to ignore the football and wave a feeble hand at the beach ball, whether to curse it or to try and save it in the hope that the referee would be colour blind and think it is the football he's saved we'll never know. He failed anyway.

The supremely sweet irony lies in the fact that the beach ball was.. a 'Pool branded ball thrown by an industriously moronic 'Pool fan. ('Pool, beach - heh)

I feel sorry for the poor kid. His moment of stupidity has in all likelihood caused him to be disowned by his family by now and has probably dared not make the trip back to his hometown for fear of being lynched and quartered. Because, like every other self-respecting set of fans, the Liverpool supporters would have invariably laid the entire blame of the loss on him and his ball, completely ignoring the fact that they were second best and deserved to lose anyway. In fact, if Liverpool fall short of the title by a whopping ten-fifteen points (which is looking entirely possible right now), they'll blame the whole thing on that ball.

But maybe they have a right to be paranoid. Maybe the whole thing was planned all along. But who would be so insidiously devious to come up with such a cunning plan to crush the morale of the Liverpool players?
http://i37.tinypic.com/2njg5tl.gif
Who else?