The great disgrace of Barça

Many of the great passages of the Champions League are illustrated with the goals that Messi scores and those that Barça receives. The images have been alternated without being seen to receive and lift the European Cup as captain of Barça. Nor will it happen in Lisbon. At the age of 33, the sixth Champions League that the Barça captain aspires to in his reign continues to be a chimera, his team beaten in the quarterfinals by Bayern, a shirtless team, irrepressible in attack and permeable in defense, very convinced of their victory. It was not just any defeat for the Catalans but rather that the passage of time, lost as Barça is in Europe since the last title in Berlin 2015, demands that measures be finally taken at the Camp Nou. A year before the elections, the Barça entity needs a change in the helm in the dressing room if it does not want to also lose Messi and start a more regrettable and sterile casting even than it has been since the departure of Xavi, Iniesta and Neymar.

Today they are a lost team, the laughingstock of the competition after passing through Paris, Rome, Liverpool and Lisbon. The match played at the Estádio da Luz was a compendium of the miseries of Barcelona. The Barça photograph tore the eyes of the fans, no matter how much advertised it was since the regression assumed by Messi himself. The game is not enough to win or to compete with very well thought out and spring teams like Bayern. Beckenbauer and Matthäus were as arrogant as they were sincere with their forecast as soon as they arrived in Lisbon.

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Barcelona Ter Stegen, Nelson Semedo, Piqué, Alba, Clement Lenglet, Vidal, Sergi Roberto (Griezmann, min. 45), Busquets (Ansu Fati, min. 69), Frenkie De Jong, Messi and Luis SuárezBayernNeuer, Alphonso Davies (Lucas, min 83), Alaba, Joshua Kimmich, Boateng (Niklas Süle, min. 75), Leon Goretzka (Tolisso, min. 83), Perisic (Kingsley Coman, min. 66), Serge Gnabry (Coutinho, min. 74), Thiago , Müller and Lewandowski

For Barça, a game that was quieter than quicker would suit them due to the age of its players and the game of Bayern, a tireless team, powerful in attack, difficult to contain and fearsome due to the attack that Lewandowski leads. The Catalans had prepared not to give in and extend their options until the end of the contest when they were confused with the goals of Müller and Alaba at their own goal, proof of Bayern's dominance. The Barcelona fans accepted the exchange of blows, encouraged by their ease of reaching Neuer's goal, and took three more goals in half an hour, 14 shots in total before reaching the break: 4-1.

German pressure

The party was turned upside down from pressure on Bayern. The Germans sanctioned each Barça loss with a shot until they made a fool of Ter Stegen, more diminished than ever in his duel with Neuer. The retreat has long been the weak point of Barcelona, ​​a tired, stale and aging team in which even midfielders like Sergi Roberto and Busquets have lost reliability in the pass, atrocified by the strength of the Germans, far superior in the two areas, also in Neuer. Forwards like Suárez and Messi were not right when they reached the rival field in a position of advantage and on the contrary the defense trembled from Semedo to Alba. The colossi were not Piqué or Lenglet but the tips of the undefeated Flick.

Setién's plan lost its meaning with Perisic's second goal. The Barça coach had opted to strengthen his flanks, he preferred a fourth midfielder to a third forward (4-4-2), and as is customary in demanding appointments, Griezmann fell, a substitute like the recently recovered Dembélé —and also that Coutinho loaned to Bayern Munich - in an image that portrays Barcelona's failed transition. No player reflects Barça's halftime period better than Arturo Vidal in the same way that if there is a footballer who expresses Barcelona's change of mind, it is Thiago.

The match was impossible for the Chilean and for any Barça midfielder, also for De Jong, who was so outdone as Ter Stegen. The lack of rigor and defensive solidarity paid for the Bayern offense, which was administered until receiving a second goal, scored by Luis Suárez. The Uruguayan goal provoked a quick reply from Davies to make it 2-5. The passivity of Barcelona, ​​stunned and surrendered, as physically and mentally fragile, allowed Bayern to relax while waiting to know if their rival in the semifinals will be Lyon or City, Guardiola's team, precisely a technician of the Bavarian team.

The changes of Setién, simply civil servants, did not alter the landscape of the contest at all, but underlined the superiority of Bayern and the excellent moment of form of Lewandowski, who signed the 2-6. To the party, for greater scorn culé, only lacked if perhaps the goal of Coutinho. And the Brazilian did not settle for one but scored two goals for 2-8. There has never been such an insulting scoreboard in the Champions League for Barça. None of the bleeding Barca falls in Europe has been as cruel as the one in Lisbon.

The final defeat had been pregnant with many partial defeats in the Champions League. The Barça collapsed in a noisy way from the ledge through which it had been traveling for a long time without wanting to realize it, simply deceived by the presence of Messi, disheartened by the continuous improvisation and institutional instability during the term of Bartomeu. Nobody remembers Berlin anymore, but the historical humiliation of Lisbon will remain in memory. Messi did not even score, perhaps to go unnoticed and not be part of Barça's derision, a bag of blows today in Europe.