BARCELONA (Jordi Blanco) – Bayern Munich did not sweep the scoreboard but they did subject Barcelona to dramatic punishment at the Camp Nou. He thrashed him unceremoniously by 0-3 giving the impression of being able to thrash him as soon as he had wanted to crush him without compassion and, perhaps the most worrying thing for the Barça club, he taught him what his present reality is.
Barça had never lost at the Camp Nou in their Champions League debut. And this first time it was hard, very hard. A double by Lewandowski closed the Bavarian walk that Müller opened in the first half, making it clear that while Bayern is a serious candidate to play the Champions League final in Saint Petersburg, Barcelona will have to fight and suffer so as not to be left out of the eighth of end of the tournament.
Barça is a team with an exciting future and a discreet present. A team little less than made from scraps, which after not being able, knowing or wanting (or perhaps all at the same time) to keep Leo Messi changed on the last day of the summer market to Antoine Griezmann for Luuk de Jong, substitute forward at Sevilla and whose arrival at the Camp Nou confirmed the night of August 31 that the club is in a situation of extreme difficulty.
Driven by the pride that a fans devoted to the cause transferred to him and carried him flying while the push on his legs lasted, Barça kept the type for 20 minutes and resisted the German steamroller for up to half an hour. Ter Stegen had already taken out a little less than miraculous hand while Neuer was hardly a spectator when a shot from outside Müller’s area, after up to three arrivals with warnings, bounced off the back of Éric García and misled the Barça goalkeeper to place the 0-1.
Normal. Logic. Despondency and a mixture of melancholy with disbelief. It is not remembered a Barça that entered a game with such a degree of inferiority to the rival. Lisbon? Probably … But at that time, Barça fans denied the evidence of this collapse. Wanting is not power … And not knowing is being inferior, without regard and without discussion. No arguments.
UNANSWERED
Bayern passed over Barça in an absolute way. If he finished the first half dominating him at will, he began the second by subjecting him to a new offensive to which Ronald Koeman was not able to respond, sunk on his bench and without having a clear idea to revolutionize the clash.
He did it close to game time, just after Lewandowski scored the 0-2 score, finishing off a shot from Musiala to the post for going with greater alacrity to the rebound, which almost all the Barça defenders stared at.
There the coach brought out the youth, finally, to show themselves. Gavi and Demir, Nico and Balde … And even Coutinho, reappeared in the middle of the gale that Lewandowski, of course, turned into a landslide with another shot to the post, a cut and shot at pleasure.
The pleasure of Bayern, the drama of Barça …