FC Barcelona bounced back from their dissappointing defeat of last week with a spectacular 4-0 victory against Racing Santander. With this victory we have managed to extend the lead on top to five points. Real Madrid who will play Villareal at home has a chance to reduce the lead tonight. First half goals from Andres Iniesta, Henry, Marquez and a second half goal by substitute Thiago Alcantara helped Barca to a very comfortable win. FC Barcelona's performance came on the back of all recent injury troubles and this victory would have put the team in great frame of mind for the Champions League encounter against Stuttgart. As I said in the preview, this was Guardiola's 100th official match in charge of Barca and his players celebrated it in the right way. Guardiola Puyol, Pique, Marquez and Maxwell in defense infront of custodian Valdes. The midfield ghhad Toure, Busquets and Iniesta. The frontline had the regulars Messi and Henry , meanwhile Bojan got a rare start as Ibrahmovic was left out as a precaution to an ankle injury.Barca Exerts Pressure from the begining
Barca started the game very well than Racing. In the 7th minute FC barcelona went ahead with Iniesta firing his first goal of the season. Marquez played a long ball into the box from behind the half line, Racing defender who was following Henry's run failed to clear the ball and the ball fell to Iniesta who was tracking on the left unmarked. Iniesta made no mistake in poking the ball into net past an advancing goal keeper. An early goal meant that racing was going to have a difficult night and sure they did. In the 9th minute Bojan had a great chance but fired over after Henry 
laid it to him. In the 11th minute Busquets laid the ball to Maxwell but his shot was tipped over by Racing Goalkeeper, Coltorti. Barca was having total control of the game and there were no moves from Racing's part for the whole time. In the 22nd minute Coltorti saved a great shot from Bojan from a Messi pass. Then in the 28th minute Busquets won a free kick just outside the box. Henry took the free kick, which was nothing spectacular by his standard; It went through the wall into the goal past an unsighted Goal Keeper.
In the 33rd minute another free kick was awarded for handball against Toni Moral five yards away from box. This time Marquez took the free kick, he curled the ball above the wall on to the right post and into goal. In the 35th minute Racing had the ball in the net but Xisco was rightly judged offside. It was aboslute foolish from Xisco part, Canales shot was going into the goal before he from an offside position decided to poke the ball in. Valdes was a very relieved man as the chance materialised after he dropped Serrano's cross. The cetre defense pair were taking un-necessary rik at this time. Pique was lucky to escape a card and Marquez was lucky to be awarded only a yellow. These two guys looks like has never learned from their recent suspensions. The half ended with Bojan hitting the sidenetting after a lovely through ball from Messi.
FC barcelona eased off a bit in second half
As expected FC Barcelona lacked intensity in the second half and it was Racing who had the better chances in the early exchanges. In the 53rd minute the ground were witness to a freakish event which earned henry a yellow car dfor doing nothing. Henry beat Oriol to a Toure ball but his shot went wide; Oriol in his frustration ran towards referee tripping over Henry's leg, then started shouting at Henry who backed off but both received yellow cards - you got to see 
Henry's face man. In the 61st minute Iniesta fired a shot at goal but it was easy for Coltorti to save. In the 68th minute Jeffren came in for Puyol. In the 76th minute Guardiola rightly decided to give Toure and Henry some rest and replace them with Thiago and Pedro. In the 84th minute Barca completed the score line for Fc Barcelona with Thiago scoring his first senior Barca goal. Thiago played the ball to Messi on the right in the box, Messi skipped past hi defender and played the ball to Thiago who shot went inside the goal with the help of a deflection
There were questions raised about Barca's ability to shake off the recent injury crisis, but we did manage that in grand style. FC Barcelona also showed the glimpse of talent we have in our youth systems. When the game ended we had nine FC Barcelona products on the pitch, bloody hell thyat should be a record of sort. Coming into the bigger picture, this victory put us in great form for our visit to Germany in mid-week. It was really good to see Bojan in action. he may not have done any spectacular stuff but looked solid. He will definitely improve if given more playing time. Iniesta definitely was the pick in the attack and Thiago looked so good in the midfield. Now we will be witnessing a great fight between Jonathan and Thiago trying to break into first team. I would pick one guy's performance - Henry, he looked to have started enjoying his back again.