It was Barcelona’s night at the Etihad Stadium, where Luis Suarez’s goals helped Barcelona to attain a lead of two away goals. Barcelona just outclassed Manchester City in all departments of the game in the first half. Two early goals came from Suarez, and this was his first game at the English soil after his move to the Spanish League last summer.
UEFA Champions League 2014-15: A 2-1 victory for Barcelona
Though a bit of over-confidence was reflected in the game played in the second half by Messi and co. and they had to pay for it by conceding a goal. Manchester City’s only goal was scored by the Argentine Sergio Aguero in his typical style. But the road to quarter finals is going to be tough as Manchester City will have to score by keeping a margin of at least 3 goals at the home of FC Barcelona. Manchester City not lacks talent from any point but experience of playing in UCL and that showed of well in the game.
The clash would have been all over for City in the first leg itself, but all thanks to Joe Hart who made a splendid save against Messi’s penalty strike and prevented Barca to take again a two goal lead. This was Messi’s third penalty miss of the season, and the total score for misses in the penalty by the Argentine legend is now 12. Aguero kept City still in the tie for the second leg with his cult style of savior goal. City will always be in debt with this Argentine striker, after all it was his goal in the 94th minute which made them win English Premier League for the first time. A lot is expected from him in the second leg and City will need him if they want to get through this round of 16.
Well after the match one thing was for sure; the wolf of the penalty box is back in the business again. Luis Suarez did not had a great season as his goal is to game ratio was not that impressive and surely did not justify him the type of player he was. He had managed to score a total of 6 games out of the 22 matches he has played. Both of the goals were of typical Suarez style, the same Suarez everybody saw in England, being at the right place at the right time and finishing with 100% accuracy.
Apart from the penalty miss, Lionel Messi showcased the true class and in this match it was not Messi and his goal, but it was Messi passing the ball. He was seen more focused to supply the ball to Neymar and Suarez rather than himself going for the glory. He was covering a vast portion of the field, going back and forth as much possible in order to collect the ball and get into better positions so that he can pass it to other players.
The only loophole in Pellegrini’s strategy was probably to play 2 strikers. The plan was to punch through Barca’s defense but the players failed to implement it on the field, probably again lack of experience being the reason.
Tags: Barcelona, Etihad Stadium, FC Barcelona, Lionel Messi, Luis Suarez, Manchester City, Spanish League, UCL
