Blue steel stymies Catalans’ style show

IT WAS supposed to be Beauty versus the Beast at the Camp Nou last night but no one expected that it was Beauty who would lack teeth.

Jack Charlton liked to say that what his Irish teams did was not pretty but effective. For most of an absorbing but frustrating 90 minutes last night, Barcelona were pretty but not effective, all tantalising promise but no final delivery.

The essential character of the game was set from the opening few minutes, with Petr Cech booting the first of numerous back-passes the length of the pitch. By contrast, Barcelona were all flashing triangles and passes strung together like jewels on a necklace. But the brightest star of them all, Lionel Messi, personified his team’s performance, his ample threat never quite matched by the coup de grace.