Champions League as it happened: Bayern Munich 3-2 (3-5) Barcelona
Oh Neymar, what are you doing?! The Brazilian is freed and shows brilliant skill to step past his man and cut inside. There is plenty of room to shoot and seal his hat-trick, but instead he opts to slide the ball across goal from the onrushing Messi who can't get there quick enough and the chance goes.
Barcelona make a problem for themselves as Mascherano loses the ball. Lewandowski has the chance to return a pass to Muller who has broken into space but doesn't spot him, with the ball eventually finding it's way to Lahm on the right of the box. He tries to dance his way inside but is dispossessed by Pique and Barcelona clear.
What a fine finish from Lewandowski that is! Muller receives the ball from Thiago and diverts it into the path of the Poland striker on the edge of the box. Mascherano stands him up, but Lewandowski shows some wonderful footwork to shift the ball onto his right and curl a precise shot into the corner of the net.
What a remarkable save from ter Stegen! Thiago again jinks his way into the box and his resulting shot deflects into the path of Lewandowski who has room to shoot on goal. Ter Stegen is leaning to his right, but shifts his weight in the other direction to get a firm hand behind the shot and keep it out. It almost trickles in but the German is quickly back up to sprawl across his goal and palm it off the line.
Too easy for Barca this time. Benatia goes up for a header to clear a long ball but misses, allowing Suarez to race into acres of space. He advances into the box and lifts a simple ball over for Neymar to his left and the Brazilian has enough time to take a touch and slot past Neuer. Suicidal defending from Bayern.
Pep Guardiola ahead of kick off:
We are the Bundesliga champions and we've had an extraordinary year, despite some difficulties.
"I've never had to solve everything based on courage alone nor have I ever told my players that we will have to be braver than our rivals.
"We have to be more aware of what our offensive duties are and, after the game, the result will speak for itself."
Bayern news: Guardiola rested four first team players in the 1-0 defeat to Augsburg on Saturday, but it wasn't much of a rest for Manuel Neuer, who was called into play most of the game after Pepe Reina was sent off. The German champions are still without Franck Ribery and Arjen Robben and it doesn't get much better elsewhere in the squad with Holger Badstuber ruled out with a thigh injury and David Alaba sidelined with a knee problem.
You can probably forgive anyone for assuming Barcelona have already booked their flights for Berlin on 6 June. A 3-0 win in their first leg clash over Bayern Munich was carried out with such verve that it is difficult to envisage anything other than Luis Enrique's side dotting Is and crossing Ts this evening.
Pep Guardiola's Bayern Munich suffered defeats either side of their thrashing at the Nou Camp, they haven't scored a goal since this month. In order to save their campaign they must call upon their powers of recovery in the same way they did against Porto in the quarter-finals, where they turned around a 3-1 defeat in the first leg before winning their home tie 6-1. They will also call upon the memory of a Bayern side not too dissimilar to this one dismantling Barcelona 4-0 at tonight's venue just three years ago on their way to sealing a 7-0 aggregate win.
It's a huge ask, but no one in Bavaria has given up quite yet. We will have all your team news coming as soon as it reaches us.
© Copyright IBTimes 2024. All rights reserved.