Welcome to the Barcelona Newcastle United preview.
Champions League Last 16 (Second Leg).
Wednesday 18 March with a 5.45pm kick-off.
This is it, the big one. Newcastle United travel to Catalonia to battle one of the most famous teams on the planet for a place in the quarter-finals of the Champions League.
Barcelona may have gone into the tie as favourites but were given the run-around at St James’ Park in the first leg.
They ended up thanking their lucky stars for the injury time penalty that ensured they were able to scrape the draw that leaves this tie very much in the balance.
Form
Newcastle have played eleven Champions League matches so far this season. The eight Swiss league matches saw United winning four, drawing two and losing two. Victories have been achieved over Union SG, Benfica, Bilbao and PSV whereas score draws were gained on our travels to Leverkusen and PSG. We lost at home to Barcelona and away at Marseille. We scored seventeen goals in these matches and conceded seven. The fourteen points gained saw us finish twelfth in the thirty-six team league. We kicked off the knock-out rounds in style, hammering Qarabag 6-1 away from home to take a healthy lead into the second leg where we won 3-2 to confirm a fine 9-3 aggregate success. Barcelona rolled into Toon last week and Harvey Barnes scored a late goal to send St James’ Park into raptures but there was still time for a desperately unlucky Toon to concede a late penalty in a 1-1 draw.
Barcelona have played nine Champions league matches this season and opened their campaign with a 2-1 win away at Newcastle. Their other seven Swiss league games saw four victories, one draw and two defeats. Wins came against Olympiacos, Frankfurt, Slavia Prague and Copenhagen. They drew with Club Brugge and lost to both PSG and Chelsea (two teams that have been unable to beat NUFC this season). They scored twenty-two goals in these eight matches and conceded fourteen. As they finished fifth in the league phase, they qualified automatically for the last-sixteen and didn’t need to compete in a play-off round. They travelled to St James’ last week and were given a hell of a game but scored a ninety-sixth minute penalty to secure a 1-1 draw.
Last time out
Newcastle travelled to Stamford Bridge on Saturday evening and earned an impressive 1-0 win through an early goal from Anthony Gordon. The Toon cut through Chelsea for the goal with four passes taking the ball from the ‘keeper to the opposition net. Livramento took the ball from Ramsey and thread an inch-perfect pass to Willock who burst through on goal before unselfishly squaring the ball to Gordon who had the simple task of tapping the ball into an empty net. Newcastle continued to take the game to the blues and had two decent penalty shouts turned down by VAR before Chelsea players started throwing themselves to the ground at every opportunity in an attempt to cheat their way to an advantage. The Toon held firm in the face of such spoiling tactics and were celebrating a fine win come full time as they muscled into the top half of the Premier League table.
Barcelona hosted Sevilla on Sunday and cruised to a 5-2 victory. They scored two early penalties to put the pressure on their struggling opponents and added a third before half-time as they threatened to run riot. Sevilla were able to score consolation goals at the end of each half but Barca added two more to their tally to blow Sevilla away and ensure they remained four points clear at the top of La Liga.
Stat attack!
-Newcastle and Barcelona have met on six previous champions league occasions. Newcastle have won one, drawn one and lost four.
-The Toon have played six competitive matches in Spain in their history, winning two and losing four.
-NUFC have scored in all eleven of their Champions League matches this season.
Memorable match
In December 2002, Sir Bobby Robson was welcomed with open arms as he returned to Barcelona having previously been a well-respected and very successful manager of the Catalan Giants. Newcastle had reached the last sixteen stage in incredible circumstances, having lost their first three matches without scoring a goal but then beating Juventus. Dynamo Kiev and Feyenoord to qualify for the second group stage (the format of the competition being different back then). As the anticipation grew ahead of the match, the rain hammered down, getting worse and worse as the day went on. In fact, locals said it was the worst rain seen in Barcelona since they played…Newcastle in 1997. After pitch inspections and an iconic image of Sir Bobby holding an umbrella, it became apparent that the match wouldn’t be going ahead and would have to be postponed, provisionally for the next day. This caused chaos amongst the four thousand travelling fans who then had to rearrange travel, work and family commitments with no guarantee that the pitch would even be able to accommodate a match the next day.
Around two thousand were able to beg, borrow and steal enough to stay on for an extra twenty-four hours and were rewarded with the match taking place. NUFC had started the second group stage with a disastrous 4-1 defeat at home to Inter Milan that saw Shearer and Bellamy suspended meaning Shola Ameobi was thrust into the limelight and he didn’t disappoint. Newcastle went behind after just seven minutes and it seemed like it would be one of those days with Marc Overmars running the show, he’d previously destroyed us in the 1998 FA Cup Final and had the Toon on the back foot throughout the first twenty minutes of this match. Thankfully Toon were able to wrest back some momentum and nearly equalised when Robert tested the ‘keeper and Solano was unable to convert the rebound. Soon after, Solano and Dyer linked up well to supply Ameobi with the opportunity to slot the ball into the back of the net and send the away fans wild. The equaliser reinvigorated NUFC who then took the game to Barcelona and enjoyed a period of attacking pressure looking to score another and take a lead into halftime. Unfortunately, reality intervened when future-mag Kluivert scored against the run of play but as the halftime whistle went, Newcastle United were more than holding their own. Any dreams of a famous result were dashed in the fifty-eighth minute when Barcelona were given a corner and a headed effort should have been comfortably cleared off the line by Kieron Dyer. Unfortunately, he was leaning against the post, not paying attention and allowed the ball to just cross the line before flicking a heel towards it. This was a desperately unprofessional goal to concede and Sir Bobby was far from amused as the Toon lost their second Champions League game in succession. Barcelona 3-1 Newcastle.
Played for both
Sir Bobby Robson didn’t play for either side but it’s safe to say his impact on both clubs was long-lasting and inspirational. As manager of Barcelona he won the Copa del Rey, Supercopa de España and UEFA Cup Winners’ Cup in his one season in charge having made the employment of Jose Mourinho a part of the deal that took him to Spain. He spent another season ‘upstairs’ at the Catalan giants and is fondly remembered by their supporters who celebrated his legacy with Toon fans when we were drawn against them in the second group stage of the 02/03 Champions league.
He managed Newcastle from 1999 until 2004 and took us from second-bottom of the Premiership into the Champions League with fourth and third placed finishes before reaching the UEFA Cup semi-final in 2004. His place in the history of our club has been celebrated with a bust in the players entrance as well as a statue outside the stadium. Perhaps even more impressive than his incredible managerial career is the charity he set up before he sadly passed away in 2009. The Sir Bobby Robson foundation has raised millions upon millions and continues to do incredible work for those affected by cancer.
Patrick Kluivert spent six years at Barcelona and scored ninety goals in one-hundred and eighty-two league matches. A phenomenal talent, we never really saw the best of him in his one season at NUFC. Signed by Sir Bobby in 2004, he soon found himself being managed by Graeme Souness as NUFC’s fortunes nose dived. We went from a fifth placed league finish all the way down to fourteenth in just twelve months. Highlights included winning goals against both Chelsea and Tottenham as we reached the FA Cup semi-final.
Luuk De Jong had loan spells at both clubs. He played twelve matches for the Toon in 2014 under Alan Pardew without scoring a goal. He did slightly better at Barca, scoring six times in his twenty-one appearances but neither club were desperate to snap him up on a permanent deal.
Managers
Eddie Howe after a 1-0 win away at Chelsea:
“As I said on Friday, I wasn’t aware the record was that bad here for us, so it’s nice to end that and get the win on so many levels today. That was such an important victory with what we have coming up ahead this week with the two massive games. It’s great to go into those games with the good feeling that we have and I thought the mentality, the effort today was very, very good. You mentioned the mentality and effort. It gives us huge belief. I think we needed to win today to give us any chance of winning in Barcelona and progressing through the Champions League. It’s such a difficult game, but you need that confidence that winning gives you. That’s back-to-back wins in the Premier League now, which is so important. We’ll be in a better place for today and now all eyes are on Barcelona.”
Hansi Flick after a 5-2 win at home to Sevilla:
“A lot of things were good, but at times we did not play with the conviction I want to see in my team. This is a huge week, we need to be at one hundred percent on Wednesday because otherwise we are out of the Champions League. We need to do things better. There are many things going well, but there are situations on the pitch that aren’t fantastic. It’s five goals and three points. We have many games left, but we need to play faster. We need to focus; Newcastle is a very good team. When we lost possession, we could have pressed better. Now the Champions League is coming up, and it’s important to do well.”
Charity
As it is an away match, Newcastle United fans will not be collecting opposite the Gallowgate end, for the food bank. However, you can still help out and all online cash donations are very much appreciated. For further info and/or to donate to the food bank online.
Prediction
This is a classic case of head vs heart. My head is saying that surely this is one match too far and one of the most famous teams in the world, at home, will be too much for us. My heart however believes that we have every chance of winning this tie, having outplayed Barcelona at St James’ Park last week.
I think this will be one for the ages and Newcastle will battle back from going 1-0 down to equalise in the second half. After ninety minutes the aggregate will be 2-2 and the match will go to extra time where we’ll score a winning goal to send the travelling Toon Army into ecstasy and secure a place in the Champions League quarter-final for the first time in our history. Barcelona 1-1 Newcastle (aggregate 2-2 AET 2-3)