Barcelona advances to Champions League final despite 3-2 loss at Bayern Munich

Could Pep Guardiola build a team so good that not even Pep Guardiola could defeat it?

That was the central question of the UEFA Champions League semifinals between Barcelona and Bayern Munich, which the former clinched on a 5-3 aggregate score on Tuesday.

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We were fairly certain how this was going to play out in the second leg in Bavaria. Because last Wednesday, Barca – the club that had raised Guardiola as a player, then empowered him to build the currently transcendent team in a four-year spell as manager – had walloped Bayern, the club with whom Guardiola is now trying to emulate that success. The 3-0 score seemed to kill off the return game before it had even been played.

Guardiola had tried to outsmart a team he had designed himself in the first leg, to almost disastrous effects as Bayern came out attacking and was torn apart early. They survived that but then shipped three goals late on and lost anyway.

[FC Yahoo: Look back on Bayern Munich vs. Barcelona as it happened]

On Tuesday, Bayern likewise had to push the play, with a big score to make up. And Barcelona again knew it could hang out, rather than compulsively seek to control the ball, as it usually does. Bayern would have to come at the Catalans, so they could sit back and leer covetously at the acres of vacant lands behind Bayern's high line before racing into it on turnovers. It all made for a second straight sumptuous game.

In just the fifth minute, Ivan Rakitic was easily found over the top by Andres Iniesta, but his finish was within the reach of the practically unimpeachable Manuel Neuer. The next minute, however, Bayern announced its intentions. Thomas Muller cut back a ball for Thiago, whose shot against his childhood club was blocked by a diving Gerard Pique.

But in the seventh minute, it seemed like Bayern might show some life after all. On a corner, Mehdi Benatia maneuvered into a huge pocket of space in the goal mouth. That left him with plenty of time to plan where the ball would land and how he'd head it before depositing it past the sprawling Marc-Andre Ter Stegen.

It was the first goal Barca had conceded in 645 minutes. But then it also exposed how fragile the La Liga leaders can be in the back – especially on set pieces – when they play against opponents with the talent to actually challenge them.

Sensing that there might be a chance after all, however, remote, Bayern opened up even more. And that's when it was punished by Barca's attacking trifecta, once again compensating for its flaws elsewhere on the field.

After a quarter of an hour, Lionel Messi sent Luis Suarez through the line with a perfectly weighted pass. The Uruguayan quickly squared for Neymar, who could tap it behind goalkeeper Manuel Neuer unmolested. That made it 1-1, and that meant that Bayern would need four more goals, since Barca now had the only away goal of the tie.

If Bayern wasn't dead and buried already, Neymar's routine finish drove a stake through its heart, just in case.

The two sides kept exchanging chances. Muller was denied by a sprawling Ter Stegen. Robert Lewandowski and Messi hit snap shots at the opposing goalkeepers. But then, in the 29th minute, Suarez danced through the lines again and chipped another little cross to Neymar, who took a touch and rifled in the 2-1 at the near post.

It was more woeful marking by Bayern, which now needed five goals. That isn't to say the Bavarians didn't keep trying. But Bastian Schweinsteiger headed just over. And Ter Stegen slowed a Lewandowski shot that wrong-footed him with one hand before scurrying back and slapping the ball away before it trickled over the line.

In the second half, the game slowed some, to the benefit of the Bavarians. In the 60th minute, Lewandowski equalized. He faced up to Javier Mascherano at the top of the area, and in some trickery with his feet, crossed the Argentina defender up with his feet, before whipping the ball in off the right-hand post, beating the hapless Ter Stegen. That made it 2-2 on the night.

Finally, in the 74th minute, Schweinsteiger set up Muller at the edge of the box, who swerved in the game-winner – sort of saving Bayern’s honor, even if his side still fell three goals short of winning. Plainly, the risks taken by Guardiola in the first leg had come home to roost. Not even a win in this second game got them anywhere near an overall victory in the tie.

The last time these sides had faced off was at the same stage of this same tournament during the 2012-13 season, when Guardiola was incidentally on a year-long sabbatical between leaving Barca and taking over Bayern. The Bavarians won by a staggering 7-0 aggregate score, whereupon they would lift this trophy.

That night was supposed to be the end of the dynastic run for the team that Guardiola had built. Two years have since passed, and when the Catalans are playing at their best, not even their creator can solve them.

Leander Schaerlaeckens is a soccer columnist for Yahoo Sports. Follow him on Twitter @LeanderAlphabet.