Barcelona reached their second Champions League final in three years and third in six years after a 1-1 draw with Real Madrid at the Nou Camp in their semi-final second leg clash on Tuesday saw them progress 3-1 on aggregate.
Needing to overturn a 2-0 home defeat, Real had to attack but they never managed a sustained threat on the Barca goal and fell behind to a Pedro strike in the 54th minute. Marcelo replied 10 minutes later but it was only a consolation goal for Real.
Barcelona coach Pep Guardiola praised Real for a good performance but revelled in his side’s qualification.
“It is a total success,” said Guardiola, who in his maiden season in 2008-09 delivered the treble including a Champions League success over Manchester United. “I’m very proud of my players. We won our first Champions League title in the old Wembley [in 1992] and we’re going to try and win our fourth one there at the new one.”
Real found it hard to be gracious in defeat with assistant coach Aitor Karanka saying a disallowed goal early in the second-half by Madrid striker Gonzalo Higuain supported coach Jose Mourinho’s controversial claims that Barcelona were favoured by referees.
“I think that after all that has been said this week, everyone saw what we had been going on about [with regard to Higuain’s goal],” said Karanka, who stood in for Mourinho in the dugout as he was suspended after being sent from the bench last week. “There’s no need to say any more than that, millions of people saw it.”
Mourinho chose to stay at the team hotel and watch the match on television.
The second-leg was the final El Clasico this season with the duo taking on each other four times in the last 18 days. Both teams won one match each with Real’s win landing them the Copa del Rey.
Cristiano Ronaldo
“Next year they might as well give the cup directly to Barcelona. The name of the match is Mission Impossible IV. Once again it was the referee that didn’t allow us to dictate the outcome.”
Xabi Alonso
“Many bad decisions were made against us and we’re not happy. We think we did a good job but we feel decisions really went against us. If Higuain’s goal had stood it would’ve changed everything.”
Published in The Express Tribune, May 5th, 2011.
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