Barca crush Man Utd at the Theatre of Dreams

The draw of luck has brought two world football powers to face each other in the quarter-finals, and of course no one wants to be left out of the game when the spotlight is so close.

In this match, Man United will play at home at Old Trafford, so coach Solskjaer and his team have the opportunity to create as much advantage as possible against the representative from Spain, in order to find a favorable result in the second leg at the "holy land" Camp Nou.

But in reality it is very difficult for Man United to have an overwhelming match against the representative from Spain.

Messi and Suarez share joy when Barca takes the lead.

Right after the opening whistle, Barcelona was the team that dominated the game and deployed the ball to attack at high speed.

In the 12th minute of the match, the score was opened for Barcelona after Busquets sensitively passed the ball to Messi. After controlling the ball, the Argentine superstar delicately crossed the ball for Suarez to skillfully head the ball from a narrow angle into the Man United net.

However, just a few minutes later, the organizers determined that Barcelona's goal came from an own goal by Luke Shaw.

In the first half, Barcelona had 76% of the ball. Busquets and Arthur controlled the tempo of the game very well, preventing Man United from using their strong defensive counter-attacking style. Statistics show that Barcelona made about 300 passes, twice as many as Man United.

Rashford missed many scoring opportunities for MU in the match against Barcelona. Photo: Getty

In the first half, Man United also created a few opportunities but both Rashfford and Fred's shots lacked precision.

Entering the second half, Coach Solskjae directed his players to push up the formation to find an equalizer.

And indeed, in the first 20 minutes of the second half, the home team's play improved. There were times when Man United completely dominated the game, but the "Red Devils"'s coordinated attacks were not fast enough and sudden enough to penetrate Barcelona's defense.

In their rush to attack, Man United almost conceded another goal when, in the 65th minute of the match, Semedo skillfully passed the ball and Suarez moved wisely to escape but the final shot missed the post by a hair.

MU's defense had a hard day's work to stop Barcelona's strikers from scoring Photo: Getty

The closer the match got to the final minutes, the more impatient the Man United players were, rushing to finish in situations that should have been coordinated. And the finishing moves of the Man United players in this match were completely harmless and did not create any real dangerous situations towards the goal of the away team's goalkeeper Ter Stegen: like Rashford's free kick outside the penalty area is an example.

It cannot be said that Man United did not play well in this match, on the contrary, they played very well against Barcelona and also had a few chances in the first half and the first half of the second half with delicate passes from Paul Pogba. However, Man United's attack had a bad day when they did not take advantage of the opportunities and shot the ball inaccurately.

At the end of the match at Old Trafford, Man United lost 0-1 to Barcelona. With this defeat, the chance to turn the situation around in Spain is very difficult. But everything is still ahead and there are still many opportunities for the red half of Manchester.

Goal scorer:

Luke Shaw (12', own goal)

Line-up:

Man United:De Gea, Ashley Young, Lindelof, Smalling, Shaw, Dalot, McTominay, Fred, Pogba, Rashford, Lukaku.

Barcelona:Ter Stegen, Semedo, Piqué, Lenglet, Jordi alba, Rakitic, Busquets, Arthur, Coutinho, Messi, Luis Suarez.