There was an excellent football match between Arsenal and the best football playing team in the world at the present time :- Barcelona. They beat Arsenal last year at the quarter final round 6 3 on aggregate with a four goal haul their centre forward Lionel Messi. They now have acquired Villa who like the rest of the team has great skill making perfectly weighted passes which cut through the best of defences. The thing about Barcelona is that they do not spend their time looking for defensive holes but enjoy having defences closely marking so that they can exhibit their skill and outplay. Their other outstanding ability demonstrated time after time on this night was to place themselves just on the line between being in play and offside and then because of the accuracy and timing of passes and their natural seed they are able to break forward to score.
Arsenal opened well on the night taking the game to their visitors but this time it was Messi whose pass put Villa through on his own with the flag rightly held down for him to score. At that point Barcelona moved up a gear and had several opportunities the best of all falling to Messi who again put through and with only the goal keeper to beat was marginal inaccurate so the ball crept past the far goal post and the stadium let out a collective sigh of relief. Had they scored at that point one feared that worse was to follow. However Arsenal held out and had chances themselves but always under pressure none came close. Twelve minutes from time Van Persie who had failed a couple of times before struck one of those amazingly angled shots and it was all suddenly Arsenal and with time running out Ashavin who had come on as substitute struck the ball with force into the opposite corner from where the goal keeper was positioned to take the score to 2.1. The match is still in favour of the Nou Camp home side who have only to score once to take the tie on the away goal advantage. However this is the first time Arsenal have beaten the team they try to emulate and the opportunity is there to write the history book. The previous night Tottenham had scored a vital away goal to win 1.0 against a very noisy Greek home crowd.
Arsenal opened well on the night taking the game to their visitors but this time it was Messi whose pass put Villa through on his own with the flag rightly held down for him to score. At that point Barcelona moved up a gear and had several opportunities the best of all falling to Messi who again put through and with only the goal keeper to beat was marginal inaccurate so the ball crept past the far goal post and the stadium let out a collective sigh of relief. Had they scored at that point one feared that worse was to follow. However Arsenal held out and had chances themselves but always under pressure none came close. Twelve minutes from time Van Persie who had failed a couple of times before struck one of those amazingly angled shots and it was all suddenly Arsenal and with time running out Ashavin who had come on as substitute struck the ball with force into the opposite corner from where the goal keeper was positioned to take the score to 2.1. The match is still in favour of the Nou Camp home side who have only to score once to take the tie on the away goal advantage. However this is the first time Arsenal have beaten the team they try to emulate and the opportunity is there to write the history book. The previous night Tottenham had scored a vital away goal to win 1.0 against a very noisy Greek home crowd.
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