Ferran Torres demolishes the wall

Barça reaches the round of 16 of the Champions League after beating Borussia Dortmund 2-3 in a match that ended up being epic when it should have been an exercise in tranquility. Barça played to avoid suffering, but their mistakes in finishing and their mistakes in defense led to the epic, which was where Ferran Torres was crowned king.

Flick did not want to invent in such a decisive match and continued to trust in what he has already made more than clear that is his gala team despite the fact that in LaLiga he has dropped ten points in the last five games.

Iñaki Peña had said before the match that Barcelona had to recover the spirit that had made it unbeatable. And the staging corresponded to those words. Casadó swept all the balls in the center of the field, Olmo acted perfectly as a hooker and the control of the ball was clearly Blaugrana. Everything seemed to work perfectly except the final luck.

Before five minutes of play were over, Barça had already accumulated three clear scoring chances, but one meter from the goal neither Lewandowski, nor Casadó nor Raphinha managed to push the ball. It seemed a matter of time before Barça subdued their rival, but the Germans warned that if they spared their lives, they would not be so generous and would take advantage of the gift.. Guirassy stood up to Iñaki Peña, who rejected the ball on a clear occasion, which was later disallowed for offside. But no one could take away Flick’s fear. The fear and anger at the chances for their forwards, who still had one second left to open the can. Raphinha again forgave Kobel, midway through the first half, and this time, in the reply, Sabitzer wasted a huge assist from Duranville, who was beginning to give Balde a bad night.

At the end of the first half, the feeling of Blaugrana superiority increased even more, as they continued to monopolize the game, but collided with the invisible wall, which in that first half was in front of the yellow team.. Lamine and Koundé kept trying, but nothing. At least Kobel now had to make stops. Something had improved.

The first half, which seemed like it was going to end with Dortmund shouting for a break, ended with a scare for Barça due to a fall in the area by Guirassy, ​​who noticed Iñigo’s hand and dropped. At least, in Spain that is called, but the European VAR does not use the same criteria that has been applied to Barça lately in LaLiga.

Where there were no differences between Spain and the Champions League was in living on the edge of offside. And it paid off in a double play: first because the linesman disallowed a goal against Borussia for offside and The next minute, by a hair’s breadth, Raphinha was able to score 0-1 after a great recovery by Dani Olmo. The difficult part was done, it had taken almost an hour to score a goal, but in less than five minutes Barça threw all their work in the trash. Absurd penalty from Cubarsi, which Guirassy converted into the tie. With half an hour left, the game did not start from scratch, because morally the Germans collapsed.

Things were getting ugly and Flick suddenly brought De Jong, Ferran Torres and Fermín onto the field. Raphinha left the field, touched; Olmo, cast, and Lewandowski, denied. And the first time they connected, Barça took the lead after the ‘Shark’ caught a rebound from the goalkeeper. But history repeated itself again. What had cost so much went back into the trash. Yan Couto broke the offside penalty and gave Guirassy the tie. The Südtribüne began to push and Barça began to suffer. And when he was suffering the most, Ferran appeared again in a counterattack to end the match, not without suffering until the Frenchman Letexier whistled the end of the act.

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