Barcelona mounted an incredible comeback at Estádio da Luz on a UEFA Champions League (UCL) night that saw them come back from 4-2 down to win 5-4.
Fighting for their lives after just one win in their last seven UCL matches at tonight’s venue, Benfica gave the visitors a lesson in finishing just two minutes into proceedings, as a long diagonal ball fell to Fredrik Aursnes on the edge of the box.
He crossed in for Vangelis Pavlidis to fire in his second UCL goal of the season at close range, but Barcelona won a penalty shortly after that setback, Tomás Araújo’ clipped Alejandro Balde’s heel inside the box.
Cool as ever, Robert Lewandowski deceived Anatoliy Trubin with a hop before striking into the bottom-right corner for his 86th career penalty conversion out of a possible 96.
A couple of minutes later, Gavi was put through on goal by a deflection and forced a reflex save from Trubin. Barcelona might have pressed on from there, but their comedy of errors soon resumed, with a Benfica ball over the top seeing Wojciech Szczęsny brainlessly charge out of his box and collide with Balde.
That allowed Pavlidis to roll the ball into an empty net, and it would get worse still for Szczęsny, when he upended Kerem Aktürkoğlu after he broke through the lines. Pavlidis stepped up and completed his hat-trick with a calm conversion down the middle.
Barcelona avoided further calamity for the rest of the half, save for Raphinha firing wide when it looked easier to score from a Benfica error, and then emerged strongly after the interval.
Jules Koundé was put through by a ball over the top but fluffed his lines with a mis-hit that might have halved the deficit.
With a bit more composure, Lamine Yamal may have succeeded where the Frenchman failed, but he could only fire over drastically when he picked up a lofted pass on the edge of the Benfica box.
At the hour mark, Barca boss Hansi Flick made a double change to try and salvage some pride from a dark night in Lisbon.
And the fightback was firmly on almost immediately, with yet another surreal addition to the scoresheet, as Trubin’s routine kick downfield flew straight onto the head of Raphinha and straight into the net, giving Barcelona newfound belief.
That belief was instantly quashed though, with Benfica netting for a fourth time when Tomás Araújo’s aerial ball across goal fell to Andreas Schjelderup, whose attempted square was deflected into the net by Ronald Araujo.
Barcelona just simply would not accept defeat, and they won their second penalty of the night, when Nicolás Otamendi felled Yamal in the area.
Lewandowski put the ball in the same spot as before to set up a nervy finish for Benfica. And it was all too much for Benfica in the end, as Pedri put in a cross to the back post that Eric Garcia headed in at point-blank range.
There was more drama deep into injury time though, as Benfica saw a penalty appeal turned down and Raphinha scored on the counter to break Benfica’s hearts and put their chances of direct qualification for the Round of 16 in real jeopardy, while all but sealing Barcelona’s own prospects of doing so.
