A man’s ability to play football like a god is never enough to encourage the belief that he will subsequently be handing down tablets of wisdom about the game. In retirement the supreme footballer, Pele, has been a deity with a hungry eye for a dollar, blithely attaching rent-a-reputation indignities to the memory of his incomparable career, steadily reducing the worth of his pronouncements to zero.

But the Brazilian, whose achievements ended when he stopped kicking the ball, was never equipped to be a pundit. The same cannot be said of Johan Cruyff, who ranks only a fraction lower than Pele (and certainly at the uppermost level) in the pantheon of great attacking players, and went on to claim further glory as a coach. He lifted the European Cup and four successive Spanish championships while in charge of Barcelona between 1988 and 1996. There is justification for expecting informed and balanced judgments from Cruyff, so it was a jolt to read reports that he had been accusing Manchester United of relying heavily on long-ball tactics.

At first there was a temptation to take comfort in the possibility that in belittling United he was paying them an inverted compliment, revealing how old loyalties were causing him to feel growing anxiety about their visit to the Nou Camp on Wednesday night for the first leg of a Champions League semi-final. Yet it seemed improbable that such a giant of his sport was not only willing to disgorge wildly implausible views but to risk having himself branded a hypocrite in the process. And that would clearly have been a thought in many minds if he had indeed alleged Sir Alex Ferguson’s men were inclined to favour the long-ball game as we understand it, which means launching the ball speculatively upfield and haring after it or hoisting it into the penalty area and seeking to win the ensuing battle for telling contact.

After all, just a year ago, immediately after Roma were slaughtered 7-1 at Old Trafford, Cruyff was quoted as saying: “I was on the edge of my seat. It was one-touch, total football. It was absolutely breathtaking. They produced such fantastic attacks.” How could somebody who was so impressed by United’s style of play last April be so condescending towards it now? Of course, the truth is he isn’t. The source of confusion is that familiar villain, freewheeling translation. In the English version of Cruyff’s column in the Spanish publication El Periodico presented to me by a painstaking colleague, he suggests our teams have an innate eagerness to use long passes to mount sweeping counter-attacks. There is a conspicuous eschewing of the term Spanish commentators habitually employ in pejorative references to the hump-and-hope long-ball method.

Even when carefully rendered, however, Cruyff’s analysis over-simplifies the problems Barcelona face as they enter the Champions League semi-finals as the sole non-English contenders. He is a trusted adviser of the Catalan club’s president, Joan Laporta, but last week’s comments will have less relevance as a guide to coping with United than as an attempt to stir optimism among Barça fans plunged into trepidation about their European prospects by the inadequacy of the form that has left their team trailing embarrassingly behind Real Madrid in La Liga. Having praised Ferguson’s men as the best of the three Premier League squads in the semi-finals, he assured his constituency that in Manchester there was a corresponding conviction that Barcelona were the most dangerous opposition they could be confronting. That is an unconvincing assertion. A hectic “domestic” involving Chelsea or Liverpool would have been a more daunting assignment.

United know that Barcelona, for all their recent stumbling, are sufficiently rich in individual talent (particularly the midfield creativity of Xavi, Andres Iniesta and Deco and the penetrative skills of the returning Lionel Messi, the teenage prodigy Bojan Krkic and Samuel Eto’o) to produce a night of hurtful effectiveness, both at home and at Old Trafford. But United know, too, that Cruyff’s critique of the threat they usually pose was an under-estimation marked by false emphases. They do like to hit long passes from time to time and why shouldn’t they, given they have players who can deliver precisely over a distance and attackers with the pace to profit from being released early? But their favourite means of closing on the opposing goal is high-tempo, crisply accurate and adventurous cohesion, the kind that produces swift breaks on the flanks and imaginatively contrived thrusts through the middle. If Cristiano Ronaldo and Wayne Rooney perform as they should on the big stage, United will be capable of doing major damage to a Barcelona defence whose disarray can be comically comprehensive.

Manchester United and their manager are badly in need of success in the Champions League. Having gouged just one European championship from more than two decades of trying is undoubtedly a blemish on Ferguson’s otherwise magnificent reign. And yesterday’s draw with Blackburn, which obliterated the silly notion that taking a 10th Premier League title was a formality, will make nervousness their companion in Catalonia.

As for the latest chapter in the Liverpool-Chelsea saga, betting on that is for men braver than I am. Maybe it will be decided at centre-forward. Fernando Torres is a true master of the position but all his brilliance may be cancelled out if Didier Drogba is in the mood to give his impersonation of the Incredible Hulk with touch.

Cecil on Classic comeback trail

In spring an old punter’s fancy turns to thoughts of the Flat racing Classics. And this year an extra cause for a quickening of the blood is being provided by further signs that we are witnessing a genuine renaissance in the astonishing training career of Henry Cecil. He has a special weapon at his disposal in the shape of an unbeaten bay colt called Twice Over, whose third victory came at Newmarket on Thursday when he thrillingly overcame the slightly more fancied Raven’s Pass by a shorthead in the Craven Stakes, which is traditionally regarded as a 2,000 Guineas trial. There is still uncertainty about whether Twice Over’s middle-distance pedigree will encourage starting him in the Guineas but the high cruising speed he showed over the mile of the Craven justifies giving him an opportunity to shine at the same distance in the Guineas. Mind you, I’m prejudiced. I want another chance to cheer for Henry.

Great horses and memorable triumphs were constants for Cecil through much of the latter part of the 20th century and by 2000 he had saddled the winners of 23 domestic Classics. But in the new century the fortunes of the master of Warren Place in Newmarket (the renowned yard at which he took over the string of his stepfather, Sir Cecil Boyd-Rochfort, near the end of 1968) were soon spiralling into what many suspected was terminal decline. There has, however, always been much more steel in Cecil than might be suggested by his consciously stylish dressing (pink socks became standard) and his languid, English-eccentric demeanour. His spirit remained defiant in the face of turbulence in his private life and, more recently, a battle with stomach cancer, and faith in his ability to reacquaint himself with the winners’ enclosure on the Turf’s biggest days never cracked. Throughout the long years of struggle the warmth of the supportive feeling flowing from the public and from his fellow professionals was unmistakable and when Light Shift won the Oaks for his stable last June the proof that he was not just admired and respected but loved came in an emotional flood. He had trained far more talented animals to win that fillies’ Classic at Epsom – he had seven successes in the race between 1985 and 2000 – but everybody on the racecourse realised the historic importance of what Light Shift did. Now Twice Over has prospects of making Classics-collecting a habit again for the great trainer.

Calzaghe a class act

By the time this newspaper reaches you, the result of Joe Calzaghe’s attempt to maintain his unbeaten record against Bernard Hopkins will be known, so it may seem a bit pointless for me to offer a comment that will be overtaken by middle-of-our-night events in Las Vegas. But I just want to put something on record while still immersed in ignorance of the outcome. It is my total inability to embrace any suggestion that the superbly skilful Welshman will “put the seal on his legend” by defeating Hopkins. Losing will seriously tarnish Calzaghe’s reputation but winning won’t polish it much. No fighter enhances his prestige against a 43-year-old whose best days are far in the past.