Champions League QF: Barcelona vs Shakhtar (2nd Leg)

Barcelona vs Shakhtar

April 13 @ 4:30AM (Balls Channel)

According to the commentator during their 1^st leg match, this game “looks like a formality”.  Even if Shakhtar wins, they need to score lots and lots of goals to overcone Barca’s solid 4-point advantage over them to advance to the next round.  Shakhtar captain Darijo Srna, defender Dmytro Chygrynskiy and Coach Mircea Lucescu are already saying that Barca will be advancing to the semis and even winning the finals.  Seems like they will just try to salvage what they can from the previous 5-1 defeat.

"We play for the honour of our club, the city and the fans." – Darijo Srna, demanding Shakhtar playesr a show of character on the 2^nd leg match.

I will still be crossing my fingers coz in football, you’ll never know.

Here’s what the very modest Pep Guardiola has to say:

“A serious test awaits us. We should complete our task in the Champions League before preparing for the Santiago Bernabeu. I want to repeat, again, that the tie is not already won. Anything is possible in football, but we will work hard to prevent Shakhtar pulling off a miracle.”

Maybe Shakhtar can to exploit Barca’s shakey defense (they will still be without Puyol and Abidal).  Guardiola has been saying not to underestimate this offense-minded team.  But even if Shakhtar wins this match, it will tougher for them to win in the final aggregate score though.  They also need to prevent Barca from scoring away goals (good luck with that).

I am looking forward to watching the “best team in the world” play again, it’s very entertaining to watch their tiki-taka football J

Aggregate Score:

Barcelona: 5
Shakhtar: 1

For the win:

Barcelona

They almost have this in the bag, most likely advancing to the semis.  They can just pretty much settle for a draw (but knowing Barca, they will try to score). They cab even afford to let Shakhtar score a few goals, but no more than 4 goals

Shakhtar

Except for a  5-1 (in Shakhtar’s favor) result, they need to score at least 4 goals more than Barca to reach the semis.

Key players who’ll miss the action:

            Carles Puyol (Barcelona) – injury

            Andres Iniesta (Barcelona) – match suspension

            Eric Abidal (Barcelona) – injury

            Darijo Srna (Shakhtar) – injury

            Dmytro Chygrynskiy (Shakhtar) – injury

Stadium: Donbass Arena (Shakhtar’s Home Turf)

More news articles here:

Shakhtar captain Srna backs Barcelona

Match facts: Shakhtar v Barcelona

Shakhtar Donetsk can beat Barcelona 4-0 in Ukraine – A 'serious test' awaits Pep Guardiola and his team, and other quotes from the week

Champions League preview: Shakhtar Donetsk – Barcelona

Barcelona's Pep Guardiola urges prudence against Shakhtar Donetsk as he ignores Real Madrid talk

Shakhtar have their limitations exposed against superior Barcelona (really great article..love how it described Barca as “masters of ball retention and circulation”)

Dmytro Chygrynskiy optimistic Shakhtar Donetsk can beat Barcelona

Shakhtar shorn of Srna for Barcelona decider

Rakitskiy trusts Shakhtar have learned their lesson

Yaroslav Rakitskiy urges Shakhtar Donetsk to avoid mistakes against Barcelona

Shakhtar to face Barcelona after away drubbing

Injured Bojan out of Barcelona run-in 

Here's my attempt in being an “expert”... Below are score combinations showing which team can qualify to the next round.

Shakhtar	Barcelona
0	0
1	0
2	0
3	0
4	0
5	0
1	1
2	1
3	1
4	1
5	1
1	2
2	2
3	2
4	2
5	2
6	2
7	2
1	3
2	3
3	3
7	3
1	4
2	4
3	4
8	4

Highlighted in yellow means that that team will will proceed to the Quarter finals.  Pink means the aggregate score as well as the number of away goals is a tie, so I dunno if they'll do extra time, shoot out or coin toss...