FC Barcelona's safe hands, Victor Valdes is wary of Levante.


As the Catalan giants aim to close the gap on Real Madrid's five-point lead, the feeling among the fans is that of absolute victory especially after Barca produced the best champions league performance last week by beating Celtic at an away fixture. Valdes, though, is not counting his chickens yet, as he cautions on Levante's new found form:

Levante will be motivated at the Camp Nou. They’ve been getting results lately and have just had an important win against Osasuna.

Read the full interview below:


FC Barcelona's Valdes Warns On Levante.

FC Barcelona presents the first official interview with Jose Manuel Pinto.


Since joining the Catalan giants on a six-month, convertible loan deal, Jose manuel Pinto has been on the spotlight as the experienced keeper ahs been regarded as an effective back up - and sometimes alternative - for first choice keeper Victor Valdes, who has been in spectacular form this season. The Celta Vigo safe hands is confident that he will make a great impact in Barca both on and off the pitch, while insisting that the Blaugrana have all it takes to rise to the pinnacle of world soccer. The new goal keeper has spoken once to Barca TV since his arrival, but now presents an official interview in which the custodian shares his views in a lengthy discussion. Read the full interview and watch the Spanish
version on Barca TV:


Official Interview With Jose Manuel Pinto of FC Barcelona.

Victor Valdes is alert and ready for the challanges ahead. This is seen in his recent interview.


Safe hands, Victor Valdes, who has an excellent record in maintaining long hours without conceding goals, has offered his views on FC Barcelona's new signing Jose Manuel Pinto and also on other issues such as the highly rated Barca defence, Real Madrid goalkeeper Iker Casillas and other happenings affecting the Blaugrana. Valdes, who is great friends with French goal king Thierry Henry, had some words for his friend who dedicated the goal scored against Racing Santander to Victor Valdes. In response, Valdes said:

I already knew he would celebrate it like that. He’s always joking about that and he’s a great team-mate.

Valdes then added jokingly:

I would have preferred him not to score !

Read the interesting interview below:


Valdes Happy With Goal Dedication By Thierry Henry.

Words of satisfaction and confidence come in from the star players of the Blaugrana.


The victorious players of FC Barcelona were glad to meet the press after securing a ticket to the next stage of the champions league and moving one step closer to Moscow. Some of the playyers spoke to the press as soon as they had an oportunity to, which was in the post match press conference. Valdes, Bojan and Messi all spoke along similar lines, with Bojan krkic keeping an eye on another goal record for the champions league. The players comments were as follows:


Valdés:

I slipped and so I wasn’t able to react in time. I don’t know if it was offside. It was a moment when the referee should have calmed things down and shown the opposition a card. When you see they hurt a young team mate and they kick him a thousand times and the referee does nothing, that kind of reaction is normal. Recently, away from home, we have played all kinds of teams, but we have played to our style. I don’t think the fact that Ronaldinho didn’t play is big news. It was very important to qualify top of the group.

Bojan:

I am very happy with the way things are going. It was important to win, but at least we have qualified. I am very happy with the confidence I am receiving and want to make the most of the chances I am given. I knew I had a chance of starting but until I knew it was official I was not expecting it. Ronaldinho was on the bench today, but he is a great player and I am sure he will continue to demonstrate that. I have a better chance of scoring if I play in the middle. It would be nice to score in the Champions League and I still have a game left. I have Oforiquaye’s record on my mind but it is no obsession. If I score against Stuttgart, well great, but if I don’t, it doesn’t matter. We hope we can continue like this because the derby on Saturday is very important.
Oforiquaye is the youngest player to score a goal in the Champions League.

Messi:

Our objective was to qualify, and top of the group, and so I am happy. Not only did I face strong challenges, but my team-mates did too. They played very tough. I feel fine and the most important thing is the team is doing well. It was odd to see Ronaldinho on the bench because he is such an important player for us, but I am sure we will need him on Saturday.

While warning on the dangers ahead for FC Barcelona should the dismal away records continue to hold, Valdes is hopeful things will change.



Valdes is in top form at the moment, but the unstable nature of the rest of the team has not helped showcase the keeper’s immense talents. Barca play well at home and are the exact opposite at away games. This worries everyone in the team and Valdes is very concerned that this trend must be checked and stopped if ever FC Barcelona will hope to have any chances of winning the title this season. Barca are tied on points with fourth placed Valencia. The goalkeeper, who is overdue for a Spanish national team call-up, laments over the disappointment against Getafe in which the Blaugrana went down 2-0 amid below average performance. Valdes fumes:

We’re giving away points away from home. Obviously, you can’t drop points at home if you want to win the league, but we have to examine our game in away matches to see what we’re doing right and where we could be better. There’s still time, there’s a long way to go and we can sort it out. It’s not a case of not having the desire because we go out onto every pitch to win, but the opposition set out their stalls very well in the game. They played with great intelligence and knew how to play against us. This makes it difficult for us to get results. We didn’t play as a team. I mean within the system. Our system is based on close lines and maximum pressure. This wasn’t the case against Getafe. We left too much space and in this sense we didn’t play as a team. The problem is a tactical one, a footballing one. Yesterday we gave too much space to quick players who hit us on the counter attack. Our system didn’t work.

Valdes remains optimistic that all will be well with Barca. The in-form keeper believes that the Blaugrana will bounce back into reckoning and sail above all other teams to clinch the La Liga title. Valdes concludes this by saying:

We’ve come through worse situations.

Barca, with 24 points, have slipped to third place in the Spanish La Liga table behind Real Madrid with 28 points and Villarreal with 27 points. Valencia are also tied with barca on 24 points, but are fourth due to inferior goal difference of +1 to Barca's +13.