Alexia Putellas looked at the ball, ready to take the penalty. A handball by Nathalie Bjorn inside the area had resulted in a penalty being given away by Chelsea in the 11th minute of the match. Now, Barcelona’s No 11 was preparing to give her side the lead.
The entire stadium chanted ‘queen, queen’ (a chant often dedicated to the Catalan footballer), while Aitana Bonmati asked the fans at the Johan Cruyff Stadium to lower the noise level so that Putellas could concentrate. They responded and went silent.
But her shot was central and easy for goalkeeper Hannah Hampton to save, who correctly guessed the midfielder’s intentions. “We’ll end up remembering this penalty,” said a pessimistic fan in the stands. Nothing could have been further from the truth.
Barcelona put Chelsea on the ropes in the first leg of the Women’s Champions League semi-finals and ended up winning 4-1. Chelsea did not have a single shot on goal in the second half.
“I think it’s going to be a long tie,” Barcelona head coach Pere Romeu said before the match. “I think they’ll give us possession at the beginning, but when we try to do something, they’ll react aggressively.
“They don’t feel uncomfortable without the ball, and the more they drop back, the more counter-attacking ability they have. They can also have long periods of possession because of the fast and physical players they have.”
Putellas celebrates at the final whistle (David Ramos/Getty Images)
The Barcelona coach had read Chelsea’s intentions correctly. Sources within the Barcelona dressing room, who asked to be kept anonymous as they did not have permission to speak, told The Athletic that when Chelsea reached the semi-finals, they were one of the opponents Barcelona feared most.
Barcelona’s supporters began to criticise the team’s play. The fans are accustomed to winning every game every season. This campaign had raised more doubts due to some results that were not as convincing as they were used to. There were also two defeats at home, against Levante UD and, most recently, against Real Madrid on 23 March.
Barcelona have faced Chelsea several times in the Champions League — most recently in the last three Champions League campaigns and in the 2021 final — but they had never managed to beat them at home. The collective memory was still fresh from last season’s semi-final, where they came close to being eliminated after losing the first leg.
With this context and the staff’s assumption that Chelsea would be more defensive than usual, the game plan was clear: try to create many chances early in the match to go to Stamford Bridge with a good result. What they did not imagine was that they would arrive in London with one foot in the final.
Barcelona took the game to Chelsea, who gradually allowed themselves to be subdued. Sonia Bompastor’s team played at a high tempo when attacking at first, but it didn’t last long. Barcelona had come out firing on all cylinders, determined to dispel any doubts and defend their trophy.
“The match went exactly as we wanted it to on paper,” Romeu said in the press conference after the match. “Sometimes, even if you know what your opponent is going to do, if we’re as efficient as we were today, it’s very difficult for them to recover the ball. If Patri (Guijarro), Alexia and Aitana (Bonmati) move the ball well, they lose very few balls. When we manage to do that, we’re very difficult to stop. Even if they know what we’re going to do, if the plan is executed well, it’s complicated, and today we proved that.”
One of the deciding factors was the Barca midfield. They have an established trio in Guijarro, Bonmati and Putellas, one of the best midfielders in Europe. Chelsea were more concerned with preventing the two Ballon d’Or winners — Bonmati and Putellas — from receiving the ball than imposing their own game.
The second was Barcelona’s conviction. They came out focused, pulling together and with clear ideas. This is something they have not had in every game. They believed from the start and understood Romeu’s instruction to try to kill off the tie as soon as possible. It was one of the most assured games the team has played this season.
Everyone believed, even Putellas, after missing the penalty. Far from falling apart, the captain drew on her experience and, in the 36th minute, she played a beautiful pass to Ewa Pajor to make it 1-0. Barcelona goalkeeper Cata Coll had little work to do before half-time, except for a great save from a free kick by Aggie Beever-Jones from the edge of the box.
Another key player was Claudia Pina. She did not start the game, with Salma Paralluelo playing on the left wing and Caroline Graham Hansen on the right. Graham Hansen had been on the verge of not playing the match because she was unwell until Saturday. She managed 66 minutes before being replaced by Pina.
Pina remains the Champions League’s top scorer and needed just over half an hour from the bench to increase the lead with two more goals. Pina made it 2-0 four minutes after stepping onto the pitch, and in the 90th minute, she made it 4-1, following Irene Paredes’s goal. Putellas, once again, assisted Pina with a spectacular backheel pass.
“You had fun today, didn’t you?” a journalist asked Pina in the mixed zone.
“Not long, but I had fun,” Pina replied with a smile that spoke of her desire for more minutes.
A record crowd at the Estadi Johan Cruyff watched Barcelona beat Chelsea (David Ramos/Getty Images)
Another important element was Barcelona’s full-backs. The whole team pressed hard to prevent Chelsea from finding forward Mayra Ramirez. But Ona Batlle and Esmee Brugts covered the English team’s wingers well to prevent them from receiving the ball.
The match ended with widespread celebrations in the Estadi Johan Cruyff, with the game watched by a record crowd of 5,750. Among them were Lamine Yamal and Gavi, who came to the stadium to watch their female counterparts play in a semi-final, just as they will do in a few days against Inter.
The staff and players celebrated the victory as a step towards the final. After the storm, with the stadium emptying, Jana Fernandez spoke to Keira Walsh on the pitch. A few metres away, Graham Hansen did the same with Lucy Bronze. Walsh and Bronze left Barcelona last summer to return home but suffered firsthand from the talent of their former team-mates.
“We’ve taken an important step, but nobody here is thinking about Lisbon right now,” Romeu said after the game in his press conference. “We’ve got 90 minutes of real battle ahead of us.”
Barcelona have won the first battle, but not the final one. That said, it did so by reminding Chelsea that, in Europe, they are still the ones who call the shots. For now.
(Top photo: Josep Lago/AFP via Getty Images)