fcbarcelona: One match ban for Tito Vilanova

fcbarcelona: One match ban for Tito Vilanova: The Competition Judge of the Spanish Football Federation has suspended Tito Vilanova for one match, and imposed a 600 Euro fine, for incide...

One match ban for Tito Vilanova

The Competition Judge of the Spanish Football Federation has suspended Tito Vilanova for one match, and imposed a 600 Euro fine, for incidents at the end of the return leg of the Spanish Super Cup.

In resolution that was made public today, it was reported that the Barça assistant manager will have to complete a one match ban for his response to the action of José Mourinho, who put his finger in Vilanova’s eye, in the Barça-Madrid game last August 17th (3-2). The ban must be completed in the next Spanish Super Cup game in which Tito Vilanova would participate.

Two games for Mourinho

Moreover, the Competition Judge has sanctioned José Mourinho with a 2 game suspension, and 600 Euro fine. The resolution indicates "the absence of injury or lack of conclusive evidence on the intention to do harm by Mr. Mourinho". 

Lionel Messi, a goal scoring machine

Few adjectives remain to explain what Messi, the best footballer on the planet, does on the pitch. Messi has scored 14 goals in 11 games. Brutal statistics.

14 goals in 11 official matches. Top goalscorer in the current League season, a player who has scored more goals in the history of the Spanish Super Cup, second top scorer in Barça history, tied with the legendary Kubala, and in the Champions League he’s already amongst the twelve players with most goals scored this year, and it’s worth remembering that Messi was top scorer in the Champions League for the last three seasons. 

Looking to catch Pedro 
Messi still has some personal challenges remaining. For example, do the same as another Barça player, Pedro Rodriguez, did during the 2009/10 season. Pedro scored goals in all competitions (Spanish Super Cup, European Super Cup, League, Spanish Cup, Champions League, and World Club Championship). Up to now Messi has covered four of the six possibilities. He scored 2 goals in the Spanish Super Cup against Real Madrid, 1 in each leg, 1 in the European Super Cup against Porto, 2 in the Champions League, both in Minsk against BATE, and in the League the superstar has scored 8 goals in 6 games. 

He just needs to score in the Spanish Cup and the World Club Championship, which he may well do before Christmas. 

Two hat-tricks and two double goal hauls 
Messi has already taken 2 balls home with him, signed by his teammates. Against both Athletico Madrid, and Osasuna, both at matches at the Camp Nou, Messi scored three goals. He now has 11 hat-tricks since he became a first team player. Messi has scored twice in 2 games, once in the league against Villarreal, and again in the Champions League against BATE. With these stats it’s logical that Messi heads the ranking of top scorers in the League. 

Pending challenges 
The only things remaining to him, to complete the scoring circle, are to score in the League away from the Camp Nou, and to score in the Camp Nou in the Champions League. In the first case, Messi will not be able to do this until the 25th or 26th of October, in Granada, whilst on the 18th of this month, he could score his first goal in the Champions League at home this season, with the game against Viktoria Pilsen. 
For the moment, the goal scoring machine will try to do his thing in an Argentinian shirt, against Chile and Venezuela. 

Second joint session with the reserves

Due to the absence of the international players, playing with their national teams, the first team players who stayed in Barcelona, trained on Wednesday, for the second time this week, with Barça B.

Barça trained from 11.00, at pitch number 2 of the Ciudad Deportiva Joan Gamper, in the second of four training sessions planned for this week. These are sessions notable for the absence of up to 14 players who are away with their respective national teams.

This is why the four players who remained in Barcelona, Iniesta, Maxwell, Pinto, Fontàs, trained for the second consecutive day with the team led by Eusebio Sacristan. The B Team Manager kept a keen eye on the session, as Josep Guardiola also did.

Mascherano has left

In the case of Javier Mascherano, who was working in the gym on Monday, and is suspended for the Argentina versus Chile match on October 7th, he has already gone to join up with his national team. Mascherano is available for Argentina’s second match, against Venezuela.

Two more training sessions

The first team players still in Barcelona have two more training sessions programmed, on Thursday and Friday at 11.00. Following that the players will enjoy three days off, and will not return to training again until Tuesday next week.