Just more of Lionel Messi's greatness for Barcelona and Man City's ineptness in Europe
What's there to say about Lionel Messi that hasn't already been said?
What's there to write about Lionel Messi that hasn't already been written?
[Photo gallery: Barcelona vs. Manchester City in pictures]
No kind of lyrical testament to his greatness will ever be able to describe accurately what he's just shown us. That's a copout, when it's your job to capture what's just transpired into words. But it's true all the same. Especially on his most transcendent nights. Nights like Wednesday night, when he guided Barcelona to a 1-0 win over Manchester City that didn't nearly reflect the Catalan supremacy.
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Having won 2-1 in Manchester two weeks ago, the score was plenty to see Barca through to the UEFA Champions League quarterfinals, however. It will be the eighth year in a row that the Blaugranas will be among the best eight clubs in Europe.
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And while the absolute height of this dynasty of theirs is supposed to have come and passed already, there was no ambiguity in their domination of City. It was, essentially, a doctoral thesis in soccer, seemingly taught to a haggard bunch of mediocre students who were failing freshman Intro to Soccer.
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That's probably unfair to City, one of the most talented collectives in the game, which did manage to threaten for 15 or so minutes starting at the hour mark. But for most of the night, the defending Premier League champions were very badly outplayed.
It began early on. In just the sixth minute, the beleaguered Vincent Kompany got stripped outside of his own box and Barca's Neymar pinged his finish off the near post. Five minutes later, Messi and Andres Iniesta combined wonderfully in City's box, with the latter freeing up the little Argentine with a backheel for a shot from a tight angle. Messi's hard finish was blocked by goalkeeper Joe Hart for the first of his many heroic interventions.
At length, in the 31st minute, with Barca overdue for its goal, Messi, who had spent the prior half hour nutmegging opponents like training ground dummies, picked up the ball in his own half on the counterattack. He dribbled up the right flank, cut inside and dropped a cross on a totally unmarked Ivan Rakitic at the far post, who chested down and tapped the ball over Hart and in off the underside of the bar. Messi's was a laser-guided pass, picking out a teammate clear across the field, to put this tie away once with an hour left to play.
Barca came close to scoring several times more before halftime, but Neymar, as he would all night, was too pensive in the box to convert the chances. The Brazilian did manage to unleash Luis Suarez on the brink of the break though, but his dinked lob soared over Hart but skipped off the far post.
It could have been 3-0 or 4-0 by halftime.
The second half, incredibly, was as much of a Hart show as it was a Lionel Messi one. Hart denied Jordi Alba from point-blank range from another splendid Messi pass early on. Then he saved Messi's shot. In all, Hart would face 11 shots on goal but concede just once.
His keeping City in the game allowed it a brief renaissance after the 60th minute. Several promising plays didn't yield anything, though, and when Sergio Aguero saw the penalty he had earned when Gerard Pique clumsily took him down saved by Marc-Andre Ter Stegen, City's attack petered out and its resistance was broken.
So Barcelona got back to the business of trying to score some more goals. But again and again Hart denied the La Liga leaders, stopping Messi on several occasions and probably robbing Neymar alone of a half-dozen tallies. Had it not been for the tall, peroxide-blond goalie from Shrewsbury, the score could have been very ugly indeed.
After the game, we were left with two questions.
One: Why can't this City side, enabled by more than a billion dollars in investment, put it together in Europe? For all their success in the Premier League, which they have won twice in the last three years, their Champions League record is a shambles with two group stage and two round of 16 eliminations. Granted, they had tough draws in all four of those years, but the kind of money they've spent should trump all that bad fortune.
Two: How good is this Barca side, which was supposed to be in a full-blown crisis just two months ago? Were they made to look good by this latest episode of continental malpractice by City? Or are they really back to their very best?
If they are, and there was plenty of evidence to suggest they might be on Wednesday, that could well make them the favorites to win this tournament for a fourth time in a decade.
Leander Schaerlaeckens is a soccer columnist for Yahoo Sports. Follow him on Twitter @LeanderAlphabet.
