Barcelona come from behind to beat Mönchengladbach
Wednesday, September 28, 2016
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Substitute Arda Turan and Gerard Piqué were on target as Barcelona recovered from a goal down to snatch the Group C points at Mönchengladbach.
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Borussia Mönchengladbach will walk away from this match shaking their heads in disbelief after their lead evaporated in the final 25 minutes.
The German side's hard-working plan looked like it would yield the ultimate dividend when Thorgan Hazard's first-half goal was followed by confident and successful pressing beyond the hour mark.
Then an emphatic finish from Arda Turan, only on the pitch for five minutes as a substitute, made it 1-1 before Gerard Piqué's 11th UEFA Champions League goal turned the game on its head and left Barça top of Group C.
Key player: Arda Turan
It's not easy for anyone to sit as understudy to Barcelona's fabled 'MSN' (Messi, Suárez, Neymar), least of all a proud man who yearns to win this tournament after the bitter disappointment of missing the 2014 final with Atlético. So all the more credit to Arda Turan, who turned this meeting from a damaging defeat to a smash-and-grab win for the Spanish champions. His attempted chip over Yann Sommer was perhaps the second best moment of the match. The best? His amazing goal.
Dahoud catches the eye
He may have ended up on the losing team, but Mahmoud Dahoud's display in the centre of the park will have delighted André Schubert, who said recently that the 20-year-old "was going through a sticky spell". The Syrian-born German youth international's passing was a joy to behold, but his teasing cross for Hazard's opener was the best of the lot. Schubert will be hoping Dahoud can maintain that level of performance in the coming weeks.
Gladbach pull Barça out of shape
Kudos to coach Schubert for having identified when, how and where to press Barcelona. Better still, his players spent most of the game carrying out his instructions to the letter. When Luis Enrique reviews this match he will ask "Why weren't there more passing options?" It's the leitmotif of the Camp Nou: there MUST be a series of passing triangles so that the man in possession has at least two options the second he gets the ball. For long passages here Barcelona failed to create those geometric shapes. And suffered for it.
Reporters' views
Matthew Howarth, Gladbach (@UEFAcomMattH)
Two defeats from two group fixtures does not make for pleasant reading if you are of a Gladbach persuasion, yet once the disappointment dies down the Borussia fans can look back on a highly impressive effort from the Foals. This was by no means the backs-against-the-wall affair many were expecting, though the loss means their side simply have to beat Celtic next month to stand any chance of making it out of the group.
Graham Hunter, Barcelona (@BumperGraham)
Teams come up with a rainbow of strategies to stop the modern Barcelona and this one was a good one. Objectively it's impossible not to feel sympathy for Schubert's side. They were better for much of the match: sharp, ambitious, rigorous. But what people often ignore about this era, from Josep Guardiola through to Luis Enrique, is Barcelona's 'winning' mentality. Finish them off when you're on top or you'll suffer. Almost a German mentality, you might say.