Barcelona’s Champions League stage fright strikes again in shock defeat by Shakhtar

The Shakhtar Donetsk players were celebrating in apparent disbelief. Barcelona’s manager wore a blank stare.

Looking out in the general direction of his players, Xavi might not have noticed how they stood with hands on hips, eyes to the ground, seemingly not daring to look up towards the Barca fans in the stands.

Barcelona had a mission in Hamburg: qualify for the Champions League last 16 after two consecutive eliminations from the group stage. They still have time to do that but, on Tuesday night, they failed to get the draw that would have seen them through with two games to spare.

There were no ideas in attack, no movement, no pressure, no intensity and, worst of all, there was little real intent. Instead, there was anxiety.

In the past two seasons, Barca’s tormentor in Europe has been Bayern Munich. In December 2021, they were knocked out after a 3-0 loss in Munich. In October 2022, a 3-0 home defeat ended their hopes.

They had an excuse then: the team was not going through its best moment in history and the draw paired them with difficult teams in the group stage. But the source of stress goes back further still — their drama can be traced across a progressive and more gradual Champions League decline.

In the 2016-17 season, after their spectacular comeback victory over Paris Saint-Germain in the last 16, Barca were beaten by Juventus in the quarter-finals. In 2017-18, after beating Roma 4-1 in the first leg of their quarter-final at the Camp Nou, an embarrassing return match in Italy saw them miss out on the last four.

In 2018-19, there was another collapse, at Liverpool in the semi-finals. In 2019-20, they hit rock bottom, humiliated 8-2 by Bayern (again) in a one-off quarter-final during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Barca’s three Champions League titles won between 2009 and 2015 are now just memories of what was a golden age for the club in Europe. That seems so distant now.

Only in the final 10 minutes, trailing 1-0 to Shakhtar’s well-worked first-half goal, did Barca seem to want to make up for what they could not do in the previous 80 minutes of Tuesday night’s meeting in north Germany, where the Ukrainian champions have been playing their ‘home’ European matches this season due to the war back home.

The strikers were particularly exposed. Barca had only one shot on target, through Gavi’s 61st-minute header.

Robert Lewandowski did not have a single effort on goal. Nor did he manage one against Real Sociedad on Saturday. The Poland international has now gone six games without scoring, his worst goal drought since December 2010, when he played for Borussia Dortmund.

Ferran Torres missed the target twice and, across the night, he appeared rushed. He seemed more focused on trying to shine for himself than thinking about assisting a team-mate, or helping to create play by unsettling Shakhtar on the wing. He had a chance to vindicate himself and he didn’t take it. Raphinha was no better either, with another two shots off-target.

With such an important objective within reach — Xavi has frequently spoken of European progress being a priority for the season — the most worrying thing was the team’s attitude, in the first half especially, of seemingly taking success in the game for granted.

Torres and Raphinha were the two players singled out when Xavi opted to make four changes at once to change the pace of the match with half an hour still to play. On came Lamine Yamal, Alejandro Balde, Pedri and Joao Felix. Pedri, who has only just returned from injury, was tidy, but none of them had the desired impact.

Shakhtar had already presented Barca with problems in the second half of their first meeting at Montjuic. And despite their 12-hour journey to Hamburg for this encounter, the Ukrainians evolved their game further still and were deserved victors.

Despite all this, Barca remain top of their group. They had three wins from their first three games, although the only really convincing one came in the opening match against Antwerp (5-0). At Porto, they were fortunate to come away with a 1-0 victory and at home to Shakhtar, they won 2-1 but were made to suffer towards the end.

On Saturday, too, in La Liga at Real Sociedad, they played badly but won; it’s a formula that does not usually last.

How this defeat by Shakhtar is remembered will depend on what comes next, and how the team reacts. Barca are at home to Porto on November 28 and away to Antwerp on December 13. The odds of progressing are still in their favour — a win at home to Porto would see them through with a match to spare.

It would be a true disaster if Barca fail to reach the Champions League knockout round for a third consecutive season, especially from this group. Even now, that seems unlikely, but on Tuesday, we once again saw the stage fright that has badly affected the side in Europe’s elite competition, when hopes of relief had grown.