Barcelona has become the champion of Champions league 2009 by defeating Manchester United 2-0 in the final. With this victory, Barcelona manager Pep Guardiola has become the youngest ever manager to win Champions league in his debut season. On the other hand, Manchester United failed to become the first ever European team to win Champions league title on consecutive seasons. Manchester United went into the game on the back of record leveling 25-match unbeaten steak in Europe and another victory would see them making a new record of longest unbeaten streak in Europe. Samuel Eto’o opened scoring for Barcelona which reminded of his goal in Barcelona’s 2006 victory over Arsenal in the Champions league final. Messi doubled the lead in the second half, scoring his 9th goal in 12 European appearances this season, and thus, becoming the leading scorer of the tournament.
Manchester United started off very well in the match as the Red Devils got a scoring chance in the first minute of the game. Ronaldo’s free kick was not successfully gripped by Barcelona goalkeeper and fell in the box, but Park failed to score from a close range shot. However, Barcelona went ahead in the 10th minute when Samuel Eto’o scored against the run of play. Eto’o received a pass from the midfield and then slot it pass into United post with a left foot strike. After the goal, Barcelona got on top and made a number of threatening attack. Ronaldo got an excellent chance in the 17th minute, but Pique turned him down illegally just outside the box. Barcelona then dominated most of the time before half time and the Catalan side was leading 1-0 at the half time.
Barcelona got off to a good start to the second half. Just four minutes into the second half, Thierry Henry missed perhaps the easiest chance of the game when he failed to score after getting United keeper alone in the post. No doubt, the credit must go to Manchester United keeper Edwin van der Ser who superbly blocked it for corner. Luck once again went against Barcelona just four minutes later when Xavi’s free kick hit the goal bar. Barcelona doubled the lead thanks to Lionel Messi in the 71st minute when Messi headed Xavi’s excellent cross home to break the heart of United fans.
Just a minute after conceding the second goal, Manchester United got an excellent chance of reducing Barca’s lead, but Ronaldo failed to score from it. After that Manchester United tried to create chances and in fact, they created some good scoring chances that United squandered off. Barcelona captain Carlos Puyol got a chance to increase the lead in the 85th minute, but once again ManU keeper saved the English champions. In the end, Manchester United tried their best to bring out a goal by deploying Rooney, Tevez, Berbatov, Ronaldo together in attack.
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