Two Quick Thoughts On Barcelona vs. Eibar

The Rosevelt Soccer club will be hosting its first soccer-viewing party of the 2016-2017 season this Sunday (1/22) at 2:30p. Here are a couple quick thoughts about the matchup between FC Barcelona and SD Eibar:

• Imagine if Messi, Neymar, and Barcelona were playing in South Portland this weekend.

Sounds implausible, right? I mean, we would never expect some of the world's biggest stars playing for one of the world's most renowned soccer clubs to make a trip to such a small locale. Well, that's pretty much the equivalent of Barcelona playing Sociedad Deportivo (SD) Eibar in this weekend's La Liga game.

To wit: The population of Eibar, Spain is a little more than 27,000, while the population of South Portland is about 25,500.

Further, Eibar plays in the Ipurua Municipal Stadium, which has a capacity of 6,300. That's the same exact capacity of Portland's Fitzpatrick Stadium.

This unlikely asymmetry--such a big club playing in such a small city--is made possible by promotion and relegation, a system of competition that allows clubs of all sizes to move up and down among Spain's nine divisions of professional soccer based on teams' annual performance on the field.

SD Eibar, for example, finished first in the second-highest domestic league in Spain in 2014, so they've been competing in the highest level of competition for the last three seasons. And one of the perks of having the opportunity to be promoted--an opportunity that does not currently exist for clubs in U.S. soccer--is the ability to host the world's best players, regardless of the size of a club's city, stadium, or bank account.

Here's a good, 14-minute video on the SD Eibar phenomenon:

• Barcelona is still the best club to model.

SD Eibar's rise to the top tier of Spanish soccer is remarkable. But Barcelona's performance on the soccer field should still be the focus of our players when they watch Sunday's game. To help them learn while being entertained, we'll be providing our players with bingo cards that will encourage them to watch for the same skills and habits we encourage our own players to display on the soccer field.

Here's a sample of a card: