Europa League: the rivals that Barcelona must overcome to recover its continental prestige

With the passing of time, and with the help of Xavi Hernández, Barcelona It is straightening its course with great hope. The culé crisis begins to disappear little by little, or at least that is what it seems in recent times. The recent 4-2 win over Napoli in Italy is the clear proof of it. The culé team, with this result, already qualified for the round of 16 of the Europe League and there is a lot of illusion of what can be achieved in the tournament, but there is still a discreet path to the final. Similarly, optimism is not lacking.

After leaving some doubts at the Camp Nou with the 1-1 draw, Barça resolved all of them with a great victory at the Diego Armando Maradona Stadium. The team led by Xavi is aiming high and, for this reason, they are already thinking about their next rivals. This is just starting.

However, the azulgrana team must wait until Friday to find out their matchup in the round of 16.

Barcelona’s record in UEFA against the aforementioned rivals is positive, although they have not faced all of them.

With Red Star it has been measured nine times, five of them were in the old Fairs Cup and the remaining four in the European Cup Winners’ Cup.

However, the only time Barça failed to eliminate Estrella Roja was in the round of 16 of the 1962/63 Fairs Cup, when they lost the first leg 3-2 and won the second leg 1-0. After drawing on aggregate, the pass to the quarterfinals was defined in a tiebreaker game that the Serbian team won by the minimum difference.

As for the GalatasarayBarcelona has already faced him eight times, all in the Champions League group stage. In addition, the azulgrana team has celebrated 14 goals and has only conceded six.

For his part, with the Bayer Leverkusen He has already played 10 games, eight in the Champions League and two in the Europa League.

In the first, the Catalans emerged victorious with a thrashing aggregate score of 10-2, while in the second they were eliminated after a 1-0 loss on aggregate.

The Spanish team won both times with aggregates of 6-3 and 5-1 respectively.

To the Monaco he only faced him twice in the 1993/94 Champions League quarter-final playoffs.

Finally, with Moscow Spartak it was measured four times, all in the group stage of the Champions League. AND

In general, Barcelona comes out well in the record against these rivals, but you can’t trust them. If they pass the round of 16, we would also have to wait for the results of the other teams that qualified with the culé team: Atalanta, Sevilla, Leipzig, Braga, Rangers and Real Betis. Any of them could be a difficult hurdle to overcome later, depending on what happens in the round of 16.