{"id":403012,"date":"2011-04-27T21:21:15","date_gmt":"2011-04-27T21:21:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/2011\/04\/27\/champions-league-real-madrid-0-2-barcelona\/"},"modified":"2011-04-27T21:21:15","modified_gmt":"2011-04-27T21:21:15","slug":"champions-league-real-madrid-0-2-barcelona","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/27\/champions-league-real-madrid-0-2-barcelona\/","title":{"rendered":"CHAMPIONS LEAGUE: Real Madrid 0 – 2 Barcelona"},"content":{"rendered":"

Barcelona talisman Lionel Messi scored two late goals to give his side the advantage in their Champions League semi-final tie against Real Madrid.<\/p>\n

There was little to separate the teams in a tense first-leg battle at the Bernabeu until Real’s Pepe was sent off in the 61st minute.<\/p>\n

That seemed to turn the tide in Barca’s favour and they scored when Messi turned in Ibrahim Affelay’s cross.<\/p>\n

Messi then added a fabulous second when he ran 30 yards before slotting in.<\/p>\n

It was a glorious way to score his 11th goal in 11 Champions League games and by doing so made his side firm favourites to go through to the 28 May final at Wembley.<\/p>\n

Up until he scored his first goal in the 76th minute, Messi was dancing round the fringes of the Real’s final third which was difficult to breach for much of the match.<\/p>\n

The visitors did manage to break clear of the snapping Real defence on a couple of occasions during the first half.<\/p>\n

After Xavi’s firm but telegraphed shot was well held by Iker Casillas, the Spain keeper was left floundering when David Villa’s whipped low shot from 20 yards beat both him but also the right-hand post.<\/p>\n

Casillas then came to the rescue when he dived down low to block a Villa shot after Messi had played a threaded reverse ball to the Spain striker.<\/p>\n

Real appeared content to sit back and frustrate much to the annoyance of their own lone forward Ronaldo.<\/p>\n

His supply line was virtually non-existant as Mesut Ozil, Xabi Alonso and Angel Di Maria were too busy helping at the back.<\/p>\n

So when Real did finally test Victor Valdes, it needed Ronaldo to drop deep pick up the ball and then venture forward before launching one of his rocket-fuelled efforts which the Barca keeper did well to parry away.<\/p>\n

Goalmouth action was scarce in the opening half but on-the-ball and off-the-ball incidents were not, as many predicted.<\/p>\n

Referee Wolfgang Stark kept a cool head while the melodramatics happened around him, but his resolve was finally broken when after the half-time whistle there was a fracas on the touchline as the players were coming off which resulted in Barcelona substitute keeper Jose Pinto shown a red card.<\/p>\n

It was still 11 v 11 on the pitch after the interval, but Real were soon reduced to 10 when the influential Pepe was sent off for a high tackle on Dani Alves.<\/p>\n

Mourinho, who was seen to mouth sarcastically “well done” to the fourth official and was then sent off himself for his protestations, now faced a defensive problem.<\/p>\n

Before he had time to put a new structure in place, Villa was in again to test Casillas with an angled shot that was brilliantly palmed away.<\/p>\n

So far so good for the 10-man side, that was until Messi made his move.<\/p>\n

The pacy Afellay, who came on for the injured Pedro, sped down the right and played a fizzing sqaure ball into the area which Messi go to ahead of Sergio Ramos and tapped in at the near post.<\/p>\n

Despite conceding an away goal, Real would have considered themselves to be still in the tie. But then struck again.<\/p>\n

The Argentine forward picked up the ball from about 30 yards out, skipped past Lassana Diarra, Raul Albiol and Marcelo before slotting in what could prove to be the tie-winner.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

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Barcelona talisman Lionel Messi scored two late goals to give his side the advantage in their Champions League semi-final tie against Real Madrid. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":403013,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-403012","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-local-news"},"yoast_head":"\nCHAMPIONS LEAGUE: Real Madrid 0 - 2 Barcelona - Ghanamma.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/27\/champions-league-real-madrid-0-2-barcelona\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"CHAMPIONS LEAGUE: Real Madrid 0 - 2 Barcelona - Ghanamma.com\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Barcelona talisman Lionel Messi scored two late goals to give his side the advantage in their Champions League semi-final tie against Real Madrid.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@ghanamma\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@ghanamma\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/27\/champions-league-real-madrid-0-2-barcelona\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/27\/champions-league-real-madrid-0-2-barcelona\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"\",\"@id\":\"\"},\"headline\":\"CHAMPIONS LEAGUE: Real Madrid 0 – 2 Barcelona\",\"datePublished\":\"2011-04-27T21:21:15+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/27\/champions-league-real-madrid-0-2-barcelona\/\"},\"wordCount\":657,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/27\/champions-league-real-madrid-0-2-barcelona\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"\",\"articleSection\":[\"Local News\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/27\/champions-league-real-madrid-0-2-barcelona\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/27\/champions-league-real-madrid-0-2-barcelona\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/27\/champions-league-real-madrid-0-2-barcelona\/\",\"name\":\"CHAMPIONS LEAGUE: Real Madrid 0 - 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