A shockingly poor Barça lacking in ideas only managed to hold on for a 0-0 draw against an impressive looking 10 man Racing Santander at El Sardinero on the opening weekend of the Primera División.

New signings Touré Yaya and Éric Abidal were both in the starting line up whilst Thierry Henry was on the bench, Frank Rijkaard preferring to start with Ronaldinho, Messi and Eto'o upfront. The other new signing, Gabriel Milito, was suspended for this match but will be available for the next game at home to Athletic Bilbao.

Racing could have taken the lead as early as the fourth minute when Serrano was one-on-one with Victor Valdés, but the Catalan keeper positioned himself well and came out on top to deny Racing a goal.

Racing again came close to taking the lead, Colsa broke away from the central defensive pairing of Oleguer and Lilian Thuram and then saw his shot rocket off the inside of the right hand post with Valdés well beaten.

So poor were Barça that their first real chance in the match came some 3 minutes before half time, Oleguer, Xavi and Messi all coming close to giving Barça an undeserved lead.

The second half saw Barça claw their way back into the game ever so slightly but they still looked like they were lacking any ideas on how they would break down their hosts, meanwhile, the passing from Barça's players also looked poor.

On 61 minutes, Frank Rijkaard took off the lively Messi and replaced him with Frenchman Thierry Henry. Understandably, Messi didn't look very pleased with the substitution and that was very evident every time the television cameras focused on Messi during the rest of the match.

In the 68th minute, Racing's new Polish forward, Ebi Smolarek, received his marching orders after a two footed lunge on Éric Abidal.

Straight away after Smolarek's sending off, Rijkaard put on Deco for Touré Yaya as he went all out attack in order to try and find a winning goal.

That winning goal nearly came on 85 minutes, new signing Henry picked up the ball from Ronaldinho and then took a trademark Henry shot past the keeper but the ball hit the base of the left hand post and went out.

Antonio Puerta
On Saturday, Sevilla took on Getafe at the Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan. Sevilla left back Antonio Puerta collapsed as he was jogging back towards his own goal after he suffered a heart attack. Sevilla players and medical staff all rushed onto the pitch to stop the player from swallowing his tongue.

After being attended to by the Sevilla medical staff, the player was able to walk off the pitch, however, it later emerged that he collapsed again in the Sevilla changing rooms where he had to be given cardiopulmonary resuscitation before being taken away by ambulance to the Vírgen del Rocío hospital in Seville where he is now in the intensive care unit.

A statement from Vírgen del Rocío hospital said that the condition of Puerta was "very serious" and that "he has been given assisted ventilation".

Sevilla FC have setup an email address where fans can send their messages of support to Antonio Puerta; puertaestamoscontigo@sevillafc.es

Our prayers go out to the player and his family.