Barcelona's 'artists': Messi, Neymar and Suárez
Wednesday, March 16, 2016
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Barcelona's front three earned praise aplenty, with coach Luis Enrique describing them as "unique" and beaten Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger marvelling at the three "artists".
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- Neymar, Luis Suárez and Lionel Messi all score in 3-1 second-leg win
- Holders Barcelona in quarter-finals for record ninth season running
- For sixth successive season, Arsenal are eliminated in round of 16
- Spanish side are unbeaten in 38 matches, winning the last nine
- Quarter-final draw streamed live on UEFA.com from 12.00CET on Friday
Luis Enrique, Barcelona coach
Against Arsenal, who had to go out for the win, the onus was always going to be on them. It's been a great night for us, the fans got behind us all through the game.
The fact we have reached the quarter finals for the ninth year in a row is a great statistic. I don't know if any other team has done that. I'll be happy whoever we get in the quarter-finals, the only team I wouldn't want to draw is Barça and we can't get them.
I'm happy for Josep Guardiola that Bayern won. He deserves it. His team never give up. I can believe that he was able to turn things round against Juventus. Bayern and Juventus were two possible candidates to win the Champions League. Now one is out and that is good for us.
Messi, Neymar and Suárez are very good at creating opportunities, and behind them the whole team can create for them. They also help us with the defensive work, which every team need in any competition. This team like them, and they like the team. We are very happy to have them as our strikers.
It's obvious that we have special players. On their own they can make many things happen on the pitch. They are good individually, but they all work hard for the team. That's the key to our success.
Arsène Wenger, Arsenal manager
It was a match of high quality against a team of high quality. I'm pleased with the performance we put in, our display was good. I'm disappointed with the result. We played against a team with the three best strikers I've ever seen – incredible. They can create a chance out of nothing. At 1-1 they were wobbling a bit and insecure, but we couldn't score.
We have to see the situation game by game. In football you look at your last game and analyse the positives and negatives. The last six years we lost against the team who won the Champions League. The only exception was Monaco last year. Otherwise, it was always against Barcelona and Bayern.
We didn't take the chances we created. But the quality and creativity from our opponents was exceptional, especially [Lionel] Messi. In 90 minutes he didn't miss a first touch. It’s something to admire. It's art. Barcelona have three players who transform everyday life into art. I suffered but for the rest of the world it's amazing.
It was a night of great football. That's the most important thing to take from tonight's game.