Goals from Pedro Rodriguez, Lionel Messi and David Villa helped Spanish giants barcelona clinch their fourth European Cup against Manchester United in a clearly one-sided spectacular final at the Wembley stadium on Saturday.
Despite a 36-minute leveller by United striker Wayne Rooney, Pep Guardiola’s men proved that they were just not done yet when they returned from the dressing room with an aim to finish their business. The superb superiority of a Xavi-Iniesta combination in the midfielder ensured that Messi, Pedro and Villa led constant attacks into the depths of an unsettled United defense.
Overall, the clash was reminiscent of the 2009 final in Rome featuring the two clubs, where Barcelona enjoyed the last laugh with a 2-0 victory over United. Last evening, the English Premiership winners had inspired a spirited fast-paced start of the game, creating goal-scoring opportunities but were soon snatched of their dominance by the Catalans.
Following a wave of fluidly-engineered yet futile first-half attacks, Pedro finally confirmed his name first on the scoreboard with a swerve past retirement-bound Edwin van der Sar —an error blamed on Patrice Evra, who left his mark at the wrong time to opt for a go at a dangerously looming Messi.
Just as the game had started to appear as training ground for the Spaniards, a quick succession of shot passes along the sidelines between Michael Carrick and Rooney caught the Mascherano-led defense by surprise. Rooney managed a pass to Hernandez, raising an off-side alarm, but was soon to be forgotten when the young Mexican shared it back to Rooney, who eventually directed it past stopper Victor Valdes into the net.
A 1-1 halftime score came as a relief to Sir Alex Fergusson’s boys, who were left to run in the ghostly trails of their Spanish rivals. Bossy ball possession, accuracy, speed and architectural attacking truly defined the kind of football the now four-time European champions exhibited in an emotionally-gripped Wembley stadium.
Barcelona stormed the second-half with a ‘view to kill’— and so they did. Totally, disarmed of any more chances to have a sniff at the other end’s goal, the United side gave in for a 3-1 final victory to Barcelona, raising arguments from the football-watching fraternity that indeed the Barca side are the crème de le crème of this football generation.
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