Barcelona cruised into their seventh Champions League semi-final in eight years as a double from Neymar handed them to a 2-0 win over Paris Saint-Germain to seal a 5-1 aggregate victory on Tuesday. Just as in last week’s first leg in Paris, the Brazilian opened the scoring after a sensational assist from Andres Iniesta.
Neymar then capitalized on some shoddy defending to head home his 30th goal of the season from Dani Alves’s cross. Barca will now take their place alongside Bayern Munich in Friday’s draw for the last four, the ties to be played next month. Only once in European Cup history had a side come back from losing the first leg at home 3-1 and there was little doubt about the outcome as Barca dominated proceedings from the off.
The opener arrived on 14 minutes as Iniesta collected the ball inside his own half, spun past three PSG challenges and then rolled the ball through to Neymar, who calmly rounded Salvatore Sirigu before slotting home. PSG briefly threatened to respond as Zlatan Ibrahimovic had a goal rightly ruled out for offside against his old club on his return to the side from suspension.
However, Barca were soon back in command as Lionel Messi fired just over from Luis Suarez’s knockdown before Sirigu was forced into a flying save to turn away Alves’s powerful drive before clutching Neymar’s follow-up effort.
Barca boss Luis Enrique could afford the luxury of withdrawing Iniesta and Sergio Busquets at the start of the second period for Xavi and Sergi Roberto respectively with one eye on Saturday’s Catalan derby away to Espanyol.
With the hosts taking their foot off the gas, PSG did at least have the chance to add some respectability to the score line, but unlike Barca’s star front three of Messi, Suarez and Neymar, who now have 95 goals between them this season; they were wasteful in front of goal.
Marco Verratti passed up the best chance when he pulled his shot wide when well-placed at the edge of the area, whilst Ter Stegen did well to repel Ibrahimovic’s pile driver 18 minutes from time. Messi had one final chance to move ahead of Cristiano Ronaldo as the leading scorer in Champions League history, but the Argentine’s goal drought in the competition stretched into four games as his shot flashed just wide.
With three big boys on their count, it is well evident for Spanish side to go way to Berlin and if not then bring back home the beautiful UEFA Cup.
