Recap of Barcelona's underwhelming draw to start of their 2015-2016 Champions League campaign.
First time back in Rome, facing his old team, Luis Enrique’s new team only managed to secure a point. Luis Suarez put his team in the lead midway through the first half before an Alessandro Florenzi wonder-goal tied the game up ten minutes later. Barcelona had more chances to change the score-line in the remainder of the game that Roma did, but the score remained tied at one, and both teams picked up a point to start of the new season of the Champions League.
| Roma | Barcelona | |||||||||||||
| Possession | 30 |
70 |
||||||||||||
| Total Shots | 8 |
16 |
||||||||||||
| Shots on Target | 3 |
3 |
||||||||||||
| Corners | 1 |
7 |
||||||||||||
| Fouls | 11 |
5 |
||||||||||||
| Offsides | 3 |
3 |
||||||||||||
| Yellow Cards | 1 |
1 |
||||||||||||
| Red Cards | 0 | 0 |
Lucho fielded a fairly expected starting eleven. Marc-Andre ter Stegen started in goal, while Sergi Roberto
continued to deputize for the injured Dani Alves. Gerard Pique made his
first start since "the incident" in the Supercopa de España and he was
joined by Jeremy Mathieu to form the center-back duo. The most used
midfield trio of Sergio Busquets, Ivan Rakitić and Andres Iniesta was also on the pitch. In attack we saw the return of the feared MSN trio.
Wearing their
new third kits for the first time this season, Barcelona were forced to
cope with a high Roma press early in the game. Though as soon as the
Catalans passed their way to the midfield line, the Italians dropped
very deep, with all eleven in dark red playing inside 30 yards of
Wojciech Szczęsny's goal, at times even closer. As a result Barcelona
found very little room to operate and were often forced to attempt
"thread the needle" passes, which were sometimes intercepted and led to
quick Roma counters.
The first shot of the game came from the defending champions, from Lionel Messi
to be exact, who was celebrating his 100th Champions League appearance,
already in the fourth minute, but his 25-yard attempt sailed just
inches over the crossbar. The Argentine would have another good look on
goal in the 12th minute, this time from much closer, but his aim was
again poor.
Roma seemed
content to allow Barcelona to keep the ball and wait for a poor pass
that would spring a counter attack. That has often proved to be the plan
that many teams prefer to use against Barcelona, to mixed results. The
way it was positioned, the Roma defense looked impenetrable, but
occasionally Barcelona found holes to exploit. While it continued to be
difficult for the Catalans to get shots on goal, the Barça players were
often getting in good positions to create danger.
And they were
rewarded for their persistence in the 21st minute. Mathieu sent a lovely
over the top ball to a wide open Rakitić. The defender tasked with
covering the Croatian, Lucas Digne, got tangled up with Messi and was
unable to pursue Rakitić, who was able to continue deep into the area.
There he noticed Suarez creeping in on the back post and found him with a
beautifully placed cross that Suarez headed in inches away from the
goal-line.
Barcelona
continued to attack, but being a goal down Roma also started playing a
bit more attacking football. The visitors remained the dominant team on
the pitch, but they were unable to add to their lead. In fact, it were
the Italians who would against the run of play manage to tie the game at
one, in stunning fashion. On a seemingly harmless play, in which
Florenzi carried the ball down the right side, the right-back suddenly
decided to fire on goal from the sideline from 50-yards away. Ter Stegen
only followed the ball with his eyes, hoping it would miss his right
post, but it cannoned into it and crossed the line.
Teams exchanged
scoring chances in the remainder of the half, with Barcelona taking
first crack and Roma threatening at the very end of the opening 45
minutes. Messi continued to be the main figure in Barcelona attacks as
he tried his luck twice more, but the first time his aim was off while
on the second attempt he was denied from close range by Szczęsny, after a
great run on the right side. In the dying minutes Roma pushed forward
for what could've only been described as a shock lead, but ter Stegen
was able to deny Radja Nainggolan's hot-shot from 30-yards out.
Despite having
an astonishing, for the Champions League at least, 72% of ball
possession, Barcelona couldn't take the lead into halftime. The Catalans
seemed motivated to rectify that mistake early in the second half. Just
over a minute after the restart, Messi fired a powerful shot on target
from inside the box, but the Argentine was again denied by Szczęsny.
Seconds later, Messi found the onrushing Alba, who was able to square
the ball to Suarez in the middle. The ball was slightly behind the
Uruguayan who had to attempt a cheeky back-heel to get the ball on goal,
but Szczęsny again made the save. Not cleanly securing the ball, Suarez
saw an opening the pry the ball away from the keeper, but he instead
caught the Pole on the hand, injuring him so badly that Roma were forced
into a goalkeeping change. The veteran Morgan De Sanctis replaced the
former Arsenal man.
But Roma were
able to withstand that early pressure and Barcelona were unable to
sustain that pressure over an extended period of time. Lucho also saw
that his team needed some reinforcements, so he replaced Rakitić with
Rafinha in the 61st minute. Rafinha's stay on the pitch was short lived,
though, as he was fouled from behind after just seconds on the pitch
and the Barcelona medical staff immediately signaled for a substitution.
Javier Mascherano was the man who replaced the poor Brazilian who was carted off the pitch.
The flow of
the game was poor for most of the second half, but after the
aforementioned injury Barcelona could not get anything going for about
10 minutes. Passes were off the mark, attempted dribbles were
unsuccessful and there was no energy on the pitch. Roma also didn't do
much during that time, but they were able to get closer to the opposing
goal than Barcelona did.
But Barcelona
started to up the tempo in the 77th minute when Neymar started showing
some life, after being mostly absent before. First he fired a shot from a
good spot, but his attempt was blocked for a corner kick. There he was
also a key figure as he nicely created some space on the left before the
ball made its way to the right side from where Messi fired on goal, but
was denied by the crossbar.
Two minutes
later, Iniesta and Neymar beautifully combined on the left side, which
allowed Iniesta space, but with him being now so close to the line, he
had virtually no angle to shot from and De Sanctis was able to make the
save.
That second
half bright spot proved to be just that though, a bright spot, as
Barcelona couldn't get a good look on goal until the fifth minute of
added time. Then, Messi again found Alba, but the left-back couldn't
direct the ball on goal or to a teammate and Roma managed to hold its
ground, resulting in a one-all tie. It is certainly not the way
Barcelona wanted to start their title defense, but a draw in Rome is not
necessarily a bad result. However, that will limit Barcelona in
rotating players in future games as wins will now become necessary
results for topping the group.