Barcelona are out of the Champions League this season but gave themselves and the fans reason to be proud after a 1-1 draw at the Parc des Princes in the second leg of the round of 16 against PSG. Barça played a truly exceptional first half and could have gone into halftime with an advantage of at least three goals, but a combination of a bad shot, questionable refereeing and a great night for PSG goalkeeper Keylor Navas led to a draw and a elegant European outlet. for Barça.
FIRST HALF
Barça played one of their best halves of football in recent memory in the first 45 minutes, dominating possession, pressing PSG to the brink of suffocation and controlling Kylian Mbappé’s threat on the counterattack almost perfectly.
The first 25 minutes were truly sublime and Ousmane Dembélé was unplayable. The Frenchman required two staggering saves from Navas and made a great cross that Lionel Messi couldn’t reach for a tap-in, and Sergiño Dest hit the crossbar for good measure.
Barça should have scored at least twice in that spectacular start, but could not and then was punished with three minutes of madness, which began with Óscar Mingueza receiving a yellow card and almost being sent off 30 seconds later for two bad fouls on Mbappé, and then Clément Lenglet accidentally stepped on Mauro Icardi’s ankle and was awarded a ridiculous penalty after a VAR control, and Mbappé scored from the penalty spot to give PSG the lead.
Barça could have collapsed after those three minutes, but quickly recovered and kept attacking, and Lionel Messi scored one of the great goals of his career with a 35-meter rocket to equalize and give life to Barça. Then just before halftime, Layvin Kurzawa kicked Antoine Griezmann inside the box and there was a great opportunity for him. Blaugrana.
Messi stepped on the point, threw a poor penalty and Navas saved him against the crossbar. At halftime, a spectacular Barça deserved to be at least three goals up, but the match was somehow 1-1 with an impossible job for him Blaugrana do in the second half.
SECOND HALF
Barça worked so hard in the first half that they were likely to have a drop in energy in the second, and that’s exactly what happened in the first 15 minutes or so of the final period, although the Blaugrana Still, he did an excellent job stopping Mbappé, who was simply dominated by Junior Firpo in that period.
PSG’s plan was to defend the entire game and with the threat of Mbappé completely neutralized by Barça, the only thing the home team could do when they reached the last 10 minutes was to park the bus and hope there were no more problems until final whistle. Ronald Koeman sent as many attacking players as he could, but Barça seemed completely powerless to score three goals in the closing seconds.
the Blaugrana he never gave up but couldn’t find another goal, and the final whistle came to officially end his European journey this season. But this was a night of encouragement, courage and pride for a team that refused to quit and put up the best fight they could have ever put up.
Frenkie De Jong and Junior Firpo were huge behind, Messi had his best European performance in a while and Ronald Koeman put together a great plan to stop Mbappé. Now it’s about the league and the Copa del Rey Final for the rest of the season, and now I have confidence in this team. They have made me proud. Thanks for the fight, guys.
Paris SG: Navas; Florenzi (Dagba 76 ‘), Marquinhos, Kimpembe, Kurzawa (Diallo 46’); Gueye (Danilo 59 ‘), Paredes, Verrati (Rafinha 84’); Draxler (Di María 59 ‘), Icardi, Mbappé
Aim: Mbappé (feather 30 ‘)
Barcelona: Ter Stegen; Mingueza (Firpo 35 ‘), De Jong, Lenglet; Dest (Trincão 66 ‘), Busquets (Moriba 78’), Pedri (Pjanic 78 ‘), Alba; Messi, Griezmann; Dembélé (Braithwaite 78 ‘)
Aim: Messi (37 ‘)
