Barcelona lose to PSG! But who is to blame?

Barcelona 1-4 PSG

In surprisingly predictable fashion, Barcelona have crashed out of the Champions League after a whole host of self-inflicted stupidity saw them lose to a team they were already outplaying.

If that sounds familiar it’s because it happened in 2012, 2014, 2016, 2018, 2019 and indeed in 2020. And that’s just since the Guardiola era! Going further back you could look at 2008, 2007, 2005… beating yourself in Europe is as much a part of Barcelona DNA as short lads passing the ball about in midfield.

The tacticos will probably find a way to blame this on Xavi while Xavi will go after the ref and the fans will go after Araujo, but who was really to blame? Let’s have a look:

1. Ronald Araujo

Well, the normies may have a point here. Barcelona had the game and tie well in-hand for the first half-hour until Ronald Araujo turned his brain off for a killer 10 seconds.

Araujo, whose brilliant forward pass started the move for Barcelona’s opening goal, tried a key pass through PSG’s lines but both Ilkay Gundogan and Lamine Yamal misread it. Nuno Mendes stuck a foot out and the ball flew with unerring precision through to Bradley Barcola. The Frenchman caught Araujo on the back-foot and ran ahead, Araujo chased him down and blocked him off, shoulder-to-shoulder.

“I think the Araújo play decided the tie. With 11 v 11 we were well organized.” — Xavi

Unfortunately, in his zeal to make the shoulder barge, he forgot that he was the last man so any leniency the referee would be inclined to give him was lost. He also, largely because of Barcola’s smart touch, jammed his knee into Barcola’s thigh. And that contact as much as the shoulder barge condemned him.

A desperate tackle like that would have made sense in the 80th minute, but the 30th??? You’ve been cooking them whenever you put a few passes together, Ronald, just let Barcola have his shot! Even if he scores you’ve still got an aggregate lead and an hour and a rabid Montjuic to get a goal back!

An unforgivably bad mistake from a world-class centre-back. He put his entire team behind the 8-ball, especially as Xavi had to remove Lamine Yamal to bring on another centre-back to cover for his absence.

“Araújo moves away and Barcola drops down. I would have liked to play 11 v 11 throughout the tie.” — Xavi

Removing the 16 year-old was the right call from the coach, but losing his penetrative brilliance after he had so wonderfully created the opener just after the club’s best defender got sent off was a sickening double blow from which Barcelona never recovered (well, kind of… more on that later).

2. João Cancelo

Much as Araujo had put his team behind the 8-ball with his red, he didn’t actively punch his own team in the crotch. That task was left to João Cancelo!

With Barcelona down to 10-men, it was going to need that much more effort from the defenders left out there. And while Cancelo wasn’t lacking for effort, he was definitely lacking for quality.

97 Passes had long suspected that Ousmane Dembélé would be the decisive factor in this tie, both because he will be motivated to stick another knife in Xavi’s back (having plunged the first one in by forcing an exit to PSG after the Catalan coach backed him to the hilt and resurrected his dying career), motivated to wind-up the Catalan crowd that was booing his every touch, and aided in his question by the sheer lack of defensive intelligence possessed by João Cancelo.

“Dembélé's goal hurt us a lot.” — Xavi

The injury to Alejandro Balde has not been given as much coverage as the midfield fancy boys getting hurt, but here in the KO stages of the Champions League is where his absence is keenly felt.

While he was never much of an attacking threat, Balde was a fabulous defender and you suspect that, were he out there marking Dembélé then the Frenchman would not have been so decisive in this match (he was voted MVP).

Dembélé’s goal saw him finish a cross from Bradley Barcola. The ball was devilishly good, curling just enough to evade Pau Cubarsi at the near-post, but it reached Dembélé at the back-post where he was relatively unbothered by Cancelo.

Compare Cancelo chilling to how Iñigo Martinez tracked and pressured Kylian Mbappé, preventing him from tapping home at the near-post. Meanwhile Cancelo just left Dembélé alone to pick his shot — he actually did this more than once it was just Dembélé only buried the one goal.

Then, with Barcelona 1-2 down on the night and 4-4 on aggregate, he committed a neerdlessly stupid tackle. Diving in on Dembélé as the Frenchman was moving away from goal and smashing into his foot.

It was a stonewall penalty, one Mbappé buried, but it was so needless. Both of Cancelo’s errors were unforgivably bad. One gave PSG life when they looked flattened, and another allowed Mbappé to give them an aggregate lead and all-but seal the Blaugrana’s fate. Sheer stupidity.

“What we've worked for all season is ruined by a referee's decision. I told him that he's been very poor, a disaster.” — Xavi

3. Robert Lewandowski

In Cancelo’s defence, and Araujo’s defence, the killer goal in the tie belonged to Vitinha and wasn’t their fault. The Portuguese midfielder banged home from distance after a short corner routine. It was a good finish but he had an aeon to pick his spot, and he had an aeon because Robert Lewandowski’s attempts to block his shot were about as lively as his pathetic TikTok dances.

He just sort of jogged towards him, seemingly unbothered about the fact that he is clearly a player capable of shooting (he scored in the first leg, for goodness sake!) and 97 Passes would love to ask him why he was so lackadaisical in his efforts because, honestly, it was so bafflingly bad.

If that was Lewandowski’s only mistake, that would maybe be forgivable. Well, not really, but hey you could at least say he was a dominant force in attack who enabled much of Barcelona’s counter-play as he did in the first-leg.

But no.

Lewandowski, the third-highest goalscorer in Champions League history, choked so god damn hard in front of goal in a match where Barcelona were going to be desperate to take their chances.

“We had chances, but today was not our day.” — Xavi

His first chance came at 0-1, and saw him shift into enough space to smash the ball at goal. He had enough of a gap to beat Donnarumma, but instead he thundered it over.

Minutes later, Araujo was off, and the game had turned.

His second chance was actually a good rasping drive in the second-half that was well saved by Donnarumma, but that was one of the few good things he did.

Next, however, came the woe.

With Barcelona down 1-3 on the night and in desperate need of a goal, Lewandowski’s third chance didn’t end up being a chance at all really. Raphinha and Ferran Torres exchanged passes before Raphinha escaped the PSG defence with a beautiful bit of skill, but as he cut the ball back across goal Lewandowski was on his heels and so the ball just flew across the face of goal with no one tapping it in.

His fourth chance was the worst miss of all. With Barcelona gaining momentum late in the game, Lewandowski was part of a gang tackle to win the ball back 40 yards out.

The Polish striker ran towards goal and had three great options, feeding it right to Ferran Torres (then standing still to open up the cutback and an open look at goal), squaring it left for Ilkay Gundogan running alongside him in space or even playing it left a bit earlier than that for João Felix who was wide open.

Instead, Lewandowski just blattered the ball at goal, and it pinballed off Marquinhos and away harmlessly. In a game where Barcelona just didn’t have too many great chances, Lewandowski wasted two great ones and gave up PSG’s decisive goal.

This, combined with his abysmal finishing display away to Bayern Munich at the start of last season’s Champions League campaign, will haunt Lewandowski’s Barcelona career. Colossal “what if?” moments that could have changed the fortune of the team, but for his profligacy. Now Joan Laporta and Deco have a big question to ask themselves this summer.

4. Xavi????

It was bizarre for Barcelona. Their biggest letdowns in Europe were not the litany of children injuries are forcing them to field, but instead the big-name world-class superstar veterans brought in to guide the kids.

Alright Ilkay Gundogan was fine, but Lewandowski and Cancelo are major veterans of the side and were honestly pitiful. Lamine Yamal outplayed Lewandowski and 97 Passes is forced to wonder if 17 year-old Héctor Fort wouldn’t have been a better choice to defend Ousmane Dembélé than João Cancelo.

And while Xavi made the right decision to sub-off 16 year-old Lamine Yamal after the red card (he was excellent but he’s 16, making him run around even more than normal because of Barcelona being down to 10 men would have been incredibly negligent given how much he has already played this season), it does feel strange that Vitor Roque didn’t get on at all and Fermin Lopez only got 10 minutes while Ilkay Gundogan ran himself into the ground and Lewandowski was stinking up the joint.

“Lamine was doing great. It was difficult to sub him off.” — Xavi

Alas, after trusting his kids all season long, when the chips were down Xavi ran with his veterans, and his veterans let him down. Does that mean he is also to blame? Sure, probably, but not as much as Araujo, Lewandowski and Cancelo.

Either way, Barcelona are out of the Champions’s League (another European humiliation and a great chance to get to the final wasted) and Xavi has to pick his team up off the ground for the smaller matter of El Clásico at the weekend.

On the plus side, at least Ronald Araujo and Lamine Yamal have had plenty of rest!