Daniel Taylor's match report
Read Antonio Conte’s reaction …
And Sid Lowe’s view from the Camp Nou …
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A strange game to assess. Chelsea will feel that they could have scored a couple of goals and they played some enterprising football at times. Yet it also felt like a non-event at times. The truth is that Barcelona did not have to be at their best. All they needed was for Lionel Messi to turn on the style in order for them to reach the last eight. Messi, who got their goal at Stamford Bridge, scored twice, made Ousmane Dembele’s strike with a superb assist and was simply too good for Chelsea to contain. With the best footballer in the world playing like this, Barcelona will feel very good about their chances of winning the Champions League for the first time since 2015. For Chelsea, however, thoughts turn to the FA Cup and the fight to finish in the top four. That’s all from me tonight. Thanks for reading and emailing. Bye.
Full-time: Barcelona 3-0 Chelsea (4-1 agg)
It’s all over.
90 min: Chelsea take a quick corner on the right. Fabregas crosses and Rudiger heads against the bar. The ball falls to a Barcelona defender and is scrambled clear.
88 min: Ter Stegen comfortably fields Zappacosta’s shot from 20 yards.
85 min: A corner to Barcelona on the left. Rakitic swings it in and Paulinho, all alone in the six-yard box, sees his header brilliantly turned over by Courtois. Where was the marking?
83 min: “Not going to mention that Messi has just scored his 100th Champions League goal?” says Henry Carter.
I am bias.
82 min: Chelsea make their final change, Eden Hazard making way for Pedro, who receives a fine ovation from his former fans.
79 min: From an uninviting angle on the right, Messi stands over a free-kick and decides to try and complete his hat-trick. A deflection makes it awkward for Courtois, who pushes the ball over for a corner.
77 min: Fabregas sprays a pass through to Hazard on the right. The Belgian cuts a fine ball back into space in the Chelsea area. One problem: there wasn’t a team-mate within 30 yards of him.
75 min: Marcos Alonso is booked for clattering into Paulinho. Chelsea need to get Torres on.
72 min: “Thiebo Courtois has a lot of explaining to do: you’re not going to beat Barcelona by offering Messi your impression of the Eiffel Tower every time he’s shaping up to shoot,” says Justin Kavanagh.
69 min: Would Chelsea have won this if they had Messi?
67 min: Chelsea make two changes, Davide Zappacosta replacing Victor Moses and Alvaro Morata on for Olivier Giroud. Morata, the former Real Madrid man, receives a hot reception.
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66 min: Barcelona have scored four goals across the two legs. Messi has scored three and created the other. He’s absurd. Meanwhile Barcelona have made their final change, Aleix Vidal replacing Dembele.
GOAL! Barcelona 3-0 Chelsea (Messi, 64 min; 4-1 agg)
Barcelona break convincingly for the first time since the restart. Luis Suarez has far too much space as he strides through Chelsea’s half. The visitors backtrack and Suarez waits for support and assesses his options before disguising a pass to his left for Messi. Here comes trouble. Messi first touch allows him to speeds down the left, past Azpilicueta on the outside, and into the Chelsea area and he needs no second invitation to shoot with his left foot. He strikes the ball low, hard and through the legs of Courtois again. What can you say? Game over.
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62 min: And still Chelsea refuse to throw in the towel. More fine approach play creates space for Alonso, who sees his shot charged down by Pique.
61 min: Hazard diddles down the left and disappointingly shoots off target from a tight angle. It hasn’t been the Belgian’s night so far. The stoppage allows Buquets to be replaced by Andre Gomes, who’s given a huge roar by the crowd. Gomes recently opened up about his troubles at Barcelona, which explains the sympathetic ovation.
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60 min: Messi tries to slip a pass through to Dembele. Christensen covers and Courtois smothers. Meanwhile Sergio Busquets has picked up a problem. Andre Gomes will have to come on.
57 min: Messi leaves Fabregas for dead with a hilarious dummy. It didn’t amount to much, but it was very enjoyable. Not from a Chelsea perspective, though. They win the ball back and counter. Yet Willian ruins a strong run with a pass to nobody.
56 min: Paulinho is on. Not for Dembele, though, but for Andres Iniesta, who hands the captain’s armband to Lionel Messi.
54 min: Barcelona are going to bring on Paulinho soon. I fancy he’ll replace Dembele and stiffen Barcelona’s midfield.
52 min: You wouldn’t want to rule out a Chelsea goal yet. They’re still seething at not being given a penalty for that Pique challenge on Alonso, but they’re still on top at the moment. The game is largely being played in Barcelona’s half.
49 min: Chelsea have made such a strong start to this half. Fabregas and Giroud combine superbly on the edge of the Barcelona area and the ball makes its way through to Alonso, who’s through again. He wants a little too much time, however, and Pique is able to get back. Alonso goes down and Chelsea scream for a penalty. The Slovenian referee doesn’t want to know about it. Chelsea are furious. Antonio Conte has erupted on the touchline. Replays show there was a slight tug on Alonso’s arm by Pique. Giroud is booked for protesting.
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48 min: Another look for Chelsea, Alonso breaking behind Barcelona on the left, only for Umtiti to deny him with a last-ditch saving challenge. Chelsea have to settle for a corner. Nothing comes from Willian’s corner.
47 min: Rudiger can’t do much with his header from Fabregas’s corner, but Chelsea retrieve possession on the left. Willian cuts inside and decides to shoot from 25 yards. Umtiti blocks brilliantly. Barcelona scramble the ball away. It all looks positive for Chelsea, but then they almost contrive to gift Barcelona a third after an awful, unnecessary mix-up between Courtois and Azpilicueta. Courtois has had a bit of a shocker tonight, but he makes up for his error by saving Suarez’s shot with his feet.
46 min: Chelsea get the second half underway. They make an assertive start, Moses winning a corner on the right. “Don’t get me wrong, Barcelona are still very good, but I don’t think they can win the Champions League this year,” says Kelvin. “I think Man City, Juve, Real, and Bayern are the real contenders. Man City would run that Barca midfield ragged any day.”
Half-time: Barcelona 2-0 Chelsea (3-1 agg)
The whistle blows immediately after that Alonso free-kick, which was followed by a sharp intake of breath from everyone inside the Camp Nou. Chelsea were agonisingly close to hauling themselves back into the tie. Instead they’ll have 45 minutes to score twice, otherwise they’ll be out of the Champions League. That, of course, is also dependent on them not conceding again, which might be a tall order given that Lionel Messi appears to mean business tonight. He’s made the difference so far, scoring once and creating Ousmane Dembele’s goal.
45 min+1: The free-kick is a few yards to the right of the D, so it’s perfect for the left foot of Alonso. And the Spaniard is capable of taking a mean set-piece. He shifts Willian aside and bends a beautiful effort over the wall and towards the top-left corner. Ter Stegen is worried as he flies to his left. It looks like the ball’s destined to nestle in the net. But there’s to be no Ramires moment for Alonso. The ball swings away at the last moment, much to Barcelona’s relief, and clips the outside of the post before going behind for a goal-kick.
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45 min: Willian is booked that the wall hasn’t gone back the full 10 yards.
44 min: Chelsea are still trying. Willian feeds a pass into Giroud’s feet 25 yards from goal. He turns and Pique brings him down. This is a fine opportunity for Alonso or Willian.
41: A lull.
38 min: To their credit, Chelsea aren’t giving up. Moments after that Alonso effort, Kante bustles through a couple of challenges on the edge of the Barcelona area and finds himself with only Ter Stegen to beat. Fabregas, who might be offside, tries to step in and swipe home with his right foot, but Kante is there first and he slashes a shot wide with his left. What a chance that was! Maybe there’s hope yet for Chelsea. One goal might make Barcelona nervous.
37 min: Iniesta shoots well wide from the edge of the area. Up the other end, the defiant Willian hurtles to the byline and cuts the ball back to Alonso, 15 yards from goal. He has time and space and the ball’s on his left foot, but he clips a rising effort straight at Ter Stegen, who beats it away.
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36 min: Messi’s goal, timed at two minutes and eight seconds, is the quickest of his career!
33 min: Over on the right, Messi clips the free-kick into the area, Chelsea caught unawares again. The unmarked Pique can’t quite scoop the ball over Courtois, though, and Chelsea survive.
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33 min: Messi gambols down the right, cuts inside and is brought down by Rudiger. He stays down for a while. It was a pretty innocuous foul, though.
31 min: On the one hand, Chelsea haven’t exactly been poor. On the other, this is easily their softest ever performance on this ground. For all Messi’s brilliance, it’s impossible to excuse the way Chelsea gave the goals away. It’s hard to imagine previous Chelsea teams being opened up by Barcelona so easily.
30 min: “Despite my allegiances lying with a different London team, that Ramires chip from 2012 is one of my favourite CL moments,” says Tanay Padhi. “Any chip requires some degree of impudence, but the circumstances for that one made it extra special. The Cahill injury, Terry red card, being absolutely battered by Barca for the previous 44 minutes. Most anyone else would have hurriedly hammered a rare opening like that goalwards, or taken an extra touch.”
28 min: Barcelona are starting to have some fun now, Iniesta swerving into the area from the left and completely confounding Chelsea with a gorgeous backheel to Suarez, who’s through on goal. The angle’s tight, however, and Courtois stays big and blocks Suarez’s effort to keep Chelsea hanging in the tie.
27 min: “A great diagonal run by Suarez to take defenders with him freed up Dembele,” notes Richard McGahey. That’s very true and it was superb vision from Messi to find Dembele.
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24 min: This is a weird game. It’s been fairly evenly balanced and yet there’s a danger that Chelsea are already out of it. Barcelona haven’t done too many impressive things. But Messi has done two brilliant things and Chelsea haven’t helped themselves with some generous defending.
22 min: That arguably does change Chelsea’s task. Now they have to score twice. Send for Ramires!
GOAL! Barcelona 2-0 Chelsea (Dembele, 20 min; 3-1 agg)
Chelsea break. The ball falls to Hazard on the edge of the area. His shot is blocked. The ball ends up back on the halfway line with Fabregas. Yet he dithers as the ball bounces up, allowing the alert Messi to nip in and steal possession. Uh oh. Suddenly he’s away. Out of nothing. Christensen hurtles across, but Messi’s too quick for him. He beats Azpilicueta as well, skittling to the defender’s left. Four or five Chelsea defenders recognise the danger and move towards Messi. But he’s too clever for all of them. He sees what no one else sees and plays a stunning pass across the area to Dembele, who’ arrived on the scene unmarked. The youngster takes a touch and crashes a rising drive past Courtois, who can’t stop the ball from flying into the far corner! What a time for Dembele to score his first Barcelona goal! And what a hole Chelsea find themselves in now!
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17 min: Dembele, tight to the touchline, goes to ground with Alonso nearby. Nothing doing. It’s a throw to Chelsea. There’s a strange feel to this. Barcelona were completely dominant for three minutes and scored, but they’ve looked ordinary since then and not much has happened.
15 min: Barcelona enjoy a decent spell of possession for pretty much the first time since, well, Messi’s goal in the third minute. The fear for Chelsea, though, is that Messi is simply biding his time before coming to life again.
12 min: It’s all Chelsea at the moment. They’re snapping in energetically to win the ball in midfield and they have Barcelona pinned back for the time being. Willian, who scored Chelsea’s goal in the first leg, decides to have a crack from 25 yards. Ter Stegen saves smartly down to his right. “Remember when Courtouis was a top 3 keeper?” says Rob Coughlin.
11 min: Moses wins a free-kick after breaking down the right and trying to combine with Giroud. The ball is eventually lifted into the Barcelona area. It’s cleared, but Chelsea continue to press. Hazard spins on a sixpence on the edge of the area and slips a pass through to Rudiger, who’s offside.
9 min: Now Kante nips in to win possession before finding Moses. He bursts into the area, but he’s stopped by a sliding Iniesta, who timed his tackle perfectly.
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8 min: Chelsea continue to probe, Hazard mischievous again, drifting inside from the left and finding Moses in space on the right this time. The wing-back’s low cross is cut out, but Chelsea will be encouraged by the last few minutes. They’re finding gaps in the final third.
7 min: Chelsea have realised that there might be weaknesses down the right side of Barcelona’s defence. Hazard causes more problems, feeding a pass through to the overlapping Willian, whose low ball into the six-yard box is hacked clear by Umtiti.
6 min: Willian whips the free-kick towards Giroud at the near post. The ball comes off a Barcelona player last and drifts just off target. A Chelsea corner. It comes to nothing. But that’s better from the visitors.
5 min: Does Messi’s goal change Chelsea’s task? Not exactly. They needed to score a goal anyway. They still need to score. But it’s looking harder now. Barcelona have settled and Messi is in the mood. This could become a long night for Chelsea, although they look to respond positively here, with Hazard winning a free-kick on the left.
GOAL! Barcelona 1-0 Chelsea (Messi, 3 min; 2-1 agg)
Chelsea, a little too passive, continue to sit off Barcelona. You can see the logic, but it’s a bit too simple for the home side. The ball comes to Messi on the right, 30 yards from goal. He skips past Hazard with ease and tries a one-two with Dembele. The Frenchman’s lay-off bounces off the unfortunate Alonso and falls to Suarez in the area. He prods it through to Messi, who surges in on the right before slipping a low right-footed finish through the legs of Courtois from a tight angle! A wonderful moment of opportunism from Messi, but Courtois won’t be happy with that!
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2 min: Barcelona spend a long time stroking the ball around, Chelsea happy to sit off them and remain deep. It takes 90 seconds for a Chelsea player to have a touch and that honour goes to Antonio Rudiger, who slides in to stop Ousmane Dembele surging down the right. But it’s a throw to Barcelona and the pattern continues. And...
Peep! We’re off! Barcelona, in red and blue, get the game underway. Chelsea, all in white, are defending from right to left in the first half.
Here come the teams! The Barcelona anthem is being belted out and the flags are fluttering. There’s just enough time for us to remember the time that John Terry booted Alexis Sanchez up the backside, Ramires scored a delightful chip, Fernando Torres made Gary Neville squeal and, most incredibly of all, Jose Bosingwa delivered an immaculate defensive performance as Roberto Di Matteo’s 10-man Chelsea sent Pep Guardiola’s Barcelona vintage tumbling out of the Champions League six years ago. What a night that was! Can Antonio Conte’s men emulate those heroics here? It won’t be easy. Barcelona still have Lionel Messi. They have Luis Suarez. But Chelsea have form for getting it done. We’ll soon find out if they’re capable of defying the odds again!
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Pre-match emails
“Good to see that Iniesta is playing,” Charles Antaki says. “I know the MBM has sent him barrels of love before, but as time moves on, we’re going to have less opportunity to love him again, so once more with feeling: a supremely but discreetly skilful manipulator of the ball; a ghost in tight spaces; a penetrative, progressive last-pass killer; … and also, as far as one can tell, a decent human being held in universal affection. Let’s enjoy him while we can, until he retires to tend his vineyard.”
“When Conte parked his bus at Man City - was it a dressed rehearsal for this game?” says Michael Williams. “The league has completely gone so maybe he used it as training for this match - their most important of the season...”
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Antonio Conte speaks! “I think Giroud played a good game with Hazard and Willian. We have to play against a strong team and for this reason we must be ready to work very hard, especially Eden and Willian. We decided in this way. We think this is the best decision. To face this type of team with players of great experience is very important. Barcelona like to dominate possession and you must be very good to keep calm and be prepared to suffer. As you know very well players don’t like only to run. Players like to have the ball and for this reason we must be ready to suffer when we are without the ball.”
Barcelona make two changes to the team that beat Malaga on the weekend. Lionel Messi and Andres Iniesta are in, Paulinho and Philippe Coutinho are out. There’s a more balanced look to their attack with Ousmane Dembele starting. Paulinho started the first leg instead of the Frenchman.
Chelsea have named a bold side. There’s no start for Pedro on his return to his former side, though. Instead Olivier Giroud leads the line here, with Alvaro Morata on the bench and Antonio Conte hoping that the Frenchman will be able to hold the ball up for the visitors. Eden Hazard will be pleased. He really doesn’t like playing as a False Nine. That said, Giroud has tended to struggle against this level of opposition and his lack of mobility might turn out to be a hindrance. Might Pedro have given Chelsea more pace?
The teams!
Barcelona: Ter Stegen; Roberto, Umtiti, Pique, Alba; Busquets, Rakitic, Iniesta; Messi, Suarez, Dembele. Subs: Cillessen, Vermaelen, Gomes, Alcacer, Digne, Vidal, Paulinho.
Chelsea: Courtois; Azpilicueta, Christensen, Rudiger; Moses, Fabregas, Kante, Alonso; Willian, Giroud, Hazard. Subs: Caballero, Cahill, Zappacosta, Emerson, Bakayoko, Pedro, Morata.
Referee: Damir Skomina (Slovenia).
Preamble
Hello. In the grand scheme of things it was hardly the most appalling of errors. There have been worse mistakes in the past, like Robert Green’s fumble at the 2010 World Cup, and worse defensive performances, like the one David Luiz put in against Germany in 2014. But sometimes there are games when you cannot even think about allowing your guard to drop for a millisecond. Sure, if Andreas Christensen had rolled a square pass across his own area last Saturday, then the ball probably would have been spanked into the upper tier of The Shed by Andros Townsend and nobody would have batted an eyelid. You can usually get away with doing that kind of thing against your Crystal Palaces and so on and so forth (no disrespect to Eagles fans, of course, it’s just that Palace were Chelsea’s opponents on the weekend). But when Christensen played a loose pass to Andres Iniesta just outside Chelsea’s three weeks ago, the punishment was swift and merciless and the complexion of this tie was dramatically altered.
Barcelona had been kept at arm’s length by Antonio Conte’s side for much of the first leg. Chelsea had maintained a deep defence, making sure that the La Liga leaders were forced to settle for slightly room-temperature possession in tepid areas, and they attempted to break with pace, energy and alacrity when they were able to spring forward, Willian and Pedro doing well to support Eden Hazard, Conte’s rebellious False Nine. Willian struck the woodwork twice in the first half before finally picking his spot early in the second, beating Marc-Andre Ter Stegen with a sweet drive from the edge of the area, and at that point Barcelona were looking flustered and sterile, arguably even a little old and in need of renovation as they searched for the spark to pierce Chelsea. Yet the narrative would change. Christensen made one false move, Iniesta set up Lionel Messi and that one glimmer was all the Argentinian needed to silence the chatter about his barren goalscoring record against Chelsea.
More importantly Christensen had allowed Messi to score an away goal for Barcelona - and if you don’t think that was a significant development, why don’t you have a word with Jose Mourinho? It means, of course, that Barcelona can afford to be marginally more relaxed this evening. The onus is on Chelsea to score. A goalless draw takes Barcelona through, which means that Chelsea cannot afford to be negative. They will have to seize the initiative at times, which might mean leaving gaps for Messi to exploit. This might not be the most scintillating Barcelona team of recent memory, but they are efficient and, not to hammer the point too much, they have Messi, who has apparently scored 472 free-kicks since the turn of the year.
But wait! Chelsea don’t necessarily have to win the game! Yes, they have to score. Yes, that will mean they can’t afford to be weird and stand around like they did against Manchester City last week. But mathematics suggests that 1-1 will take them to extra-time and penalties and that 2-2 or better will take them through on away goals. And they’ve drawn 2-2 on this ground before, first in a relatively meaningless group game in 2006, and then in April 2012 when ... well, do you really need me to go over what happened on that particular night?
Kick-off: 7.45pm GMT, 8.45pm CET.
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