December has been another great month for Barça with wins over Valencia, Madrid and Villarreal, only the defeat at home to Shakhtar spoilt it but then again that game didn't really count for anything. Having now checked the points totted up by each player you can imagine my surprise to find that the December player of the month is none other than Thierry Henry. Regular readers will know I have not been Henry's biggest fan since his arrival at Camp Nou but his improvement this season has been notable, he started this month with a hat-trick against Valencia and yesterday he grabbed the vital winner at Villarreal and was for many people the man of the match. In an interview last week...

Not really much surprise here. Despite some excellent performances from his team mates in November, Leo Messi who won the award in October is once again my player of the month. Messi played in 7 games this month, and the only one of those games that he didn't score in was possibly his best game of the month: the 6-0 victory over Valladolid. Toure Yaya comes in second and it is great to see the big man back in such excellent form after a slow start to the season. Captain Carles Puyol is third, he has excelled in every defensive position this month but he was especially impressive in the swimming...

This was a difficult one this month. Having won six out of six in October there are many players in excellent form at the moment. The defence deserves credit for only conceding two goals, but at the other end we have scored twenty this month. In the end the October Player Of The Month goes to Leo Messi who saved us with two late goals against Shakhtar Donetsk and also scored against Atletico and Basle. Second place goes to September's winner Xavi Hernandez who continues to dazzle in midfield, while Samuel Eto'o is only third despite bagging six goals in four games; he would normally win hands down with such a record but it just goes to...

I didn't do this for August as there were only three games, so the September award is actually for August and September. Anyway, the award is back and I'll be doing this for the whole season. The first winner of the season is our midfield maesto Xavi Hernandez who continues to be in splendid form after his excellent European Championship. I'm sure the Fcbnews award will mean more to him than Uefa's player of Euro 2008!

As I did last season, I will name a top 5 for each month. Please write in to tell me how wrong I am. This month the top 5 is as follows:

1. Xavi Hernandez
2. Andres Iniesta
3. Leo Messi
4. Sergio Busquets
5. Samuel Eto'o

A little late perhaps, but I've finally decided on my player of the season. Some will say his stats are not great, but even so Leo Messi has to win the award because he is quite simply head and shoulders above the rest. Only three other players can really take much credit from a generally disappointing season. Andres Iniesta is second because of his remarkable consistency and because he continues to improve, only a niggling knee injury towards the end of the season saw his level drop a bit, let's hope he gets over the problem. Third place goes to Toure Yaya whose performances in midfield had a lot to do with the improved defence in the first half of the season. His back injury had a lot to do with Barça's defensive frailty as the season wore on though he deserves tremendous credit for bravely playing on. Next i...

I take pride in trying to bring you a decent blog here so it is with great embarrassment that I have to admit I made a cock-up of the May player of the month award (see previous post). Regular readers will remember I couldn't see the Barça-Valencia game and therefore there is no corresponding match report. In my haste to prepare the post I clicked on match reports and therefore only came to three games (Madrid, Mallorca and Murcia) when the Valencia game was also played in May. Sincere apologies to everyone as now Giovani dos Santos has been relegated to fourth position. Thanks to Titi 186 for reminding me of the Valencia game though he won't be happy cos Henry still didn't win. The revised top 5 for May is as follows:

1. 
   
2. Leo Messi
   
3. Thierry Henry
   
4. Carles Puy...

Yeah, I know this all seems like years ago but for the record here is the May player of the month thing. It's a bit of a weird one this month as there were only three games of which two were defeats. Only six players played in all three games and two of them are discarded because they were too poor. I imagine some of you will question the winner but he did score a cracking hat-trick against Murcia. We also have the strange situation of having the reserve goalie included despite letting in six goals in two games, if you remember he did make some pretty decent saves though. Anyway, here's the result (there won't be a vote this time), and coming very soon you will have the player of the season announced.

1. 
   
2. Giovani dos Santos
   
3. Leo Messi
   
4. Thierry Henry
   <...

Another month where it seems there is little to smile about. However, as usual when the chips are down our very own Captain Marvel, Carles Puyol, raises his game, and he thoroughly deserves to be named April Player of the Month. He was excellent in the quarter final games with Schalke, and stayed at a decent level throughout the month despite all the team problems. The top five for April is as follows:

1. 
   
2. Carles Puyol
   
3. Leo Messi
   
4. Toure Yaya
   
5. Andres Iniesta
   
6. Gabi Milito
   

Yes, I know some will say that nobody deserves the award after four defeats in seven games this month, and perhaps I should call it least bad player of the month. While some players were truly awful this month a handful saved themselves with some good performances. Due to the lack of candidates some players have been considered for the top five despite only appearing in four of the seven games.

This months winner is Andres Iniesta who was also winner for December. The top five is:

1. 
   
2. Andres Iniesta
   
3. Sylvinho
   
4. Bojan Krkic
   
5. Xavi
   
6. Valdés