Although this match was expected to have been a closely-fought clash, it ended up being anything but. Chelsea had absolutely no difficulty in beating Barça 3-0 and not only that; the margin of victory didn't even reflect how dominant Chelsea truly were.
Within the first 21 minutes of the match, Chelsea had two goals disallowed; both would have been scored by Enzo Fernández. The first of these was denied by referee Slavko Vinčić following a handball by Chelsea defender Wesley Fofana in the build-up while the second had Trevor Chalobah in an offside position. Nevertheless, by this point it seemed inevitable that the London club would soon score the opening goal - and this happened just six minutes after the second disallowed goal; it was actually an own goal scored by Barça full-back Jules Koundé. Right before half-time, Barça were reduced to 10 men after Ronald Araújo's second yellow card.
Shortly after the interval, Chelsea had a goal chalked off for the third time after an offside in the build-up to what would've been a goal scored by Andrey Santos. Four minutes later, though, Chelsea did indeed score their second after Reece James set up Estêvão who forced his way through the Blaugrana defense into the penalty area before firing into the roof of the net.
Liam Delap scored Chelsea's third in the 79th minute, ensuring that the Blues would have the inside track for a spot in the top eight with just three league phase matchdays yet to be played. Although no one is really considering Chelsea as one of the favorites to win the Champions League, a performance like this proves that when everything is clicking, they can give anyone a tough time.
Barça, on the other hand, had absolutely no answer whatsoever for Chelsea. Tactically speaking, Barça manager Hansi Flick was completely outmaneuvered by his Chelsea counterpart Enzo Maresca. Barça's high line was easily kept in check by Chelsea's constant pressing which led to many opportunities for important passes to be played behind that high line; this was the direct cause of Chelsea's second and third goals.
While it may be a cliché to say that a certain team "just wanted it more", it's definitely reasonable to say this about Chelsea. Throughout the match, most of Barça's players weren't bringing the intensity and effort that Chelsea's were. It's no surprise that Chelsea players won most of their one-on-one duels and recovered far more loose balls; additionally, Barça's midfield trio struggled to keep up with their opposite numbers' tempo, causing many of their runs to be prematurely cut off and thus preventing the creation of goalscoring chances.
This was by far Barça's worst performance of the season to date with the Catalan club committing error upon error. The Blaugrana played several tiers below their usual level - like a team that clearly didn't seem to belong in the Champions League. In particular, Fermín López, Alejandro Balder, and Araújo deserve the most criticism for Barça's crushing defeat.
This result doesn't just put Barça in a much more difficult spot with regard to round of 16 qualification; it also gives a glimmer of hope to other teams which will notice that when they're not firing on all cylinders, Barça's low points are much lower than many, if not all, of the other teams seen as leading Champions League title contenders. Part of what it takes to be a bona fide title contender is having the ability and grit to gut out results even when things aren't really clicking. A capitulation like what Barça had against Chelsea is the exact opposite of that.
Of course, a team of Barcelona's level are unlikely to have many more, if any at all, performances over the rest of this season that are quite this bad. However, a loss like that reveals a level of vulnerability that calls into question whether they really do have what it takes to bring the Champions League trophy back to Catalonia for the first time since the 2014-15 season.
No comments:
Post a Comment