A goal from Ansu Fati, twenty minutes from the end, gave Barcelona the victory against Dinamo Kiev (0-1), at the Olympic Stadium in the Ukrainian capital, and keeps him alive in the Champions League, where he will now have to certify his qualification for the round of 16 by beating Benfica at the Camp Nou.
Electric Barça started, but their sparkling football barely lasted ten minutes. In the first visiting attack, Zabarnyi rejected a shot at Memphis, as the Dutch striker was preparing to shoot Bushchan.
Sergi had recovered Ansuf Fati and Frenkie de Jong for his eleven, already recovered from their respective injuries, and the team seemed to have another starting air, with their forward lines, high pressure and one more march in the exchange of positions and the ball circulation.
But that lasted as long as it took Dinamo to start heading towards Ter Stegen’s goal like a soul that the devil took away. The inoffensive Camp Nou team turned into the Kiev Olympic team that fiercely counterattacked at the slightest occasion. Especially on the right wing, where Tsygankov beat Alba and Ansu Fati over and over again.
From Tsygankov’s boots came the first one that Shaparenko had, who bit him with his left foot on his first arrival in the visiting area. In the second, he would shoot deflected before the departure of Ter Stegen, who shortly before had taken a shot from De Pena with his left leg.
They were the best minutes of the Ukrainian squad, which had taken the game midway through the first half. Although Barça would recover in the final stretch of the first half to sow doubt in the local defense.
After half an hour, Lenglet finished off the post, but the referee would cancel the action for offside. Before and after the Frenchman’s action, Sergio Busquets and Jordi Alba had fired high from the front. And in the last Barça attack before the break, Memphis involuntarily prevented a Nico header from crossing the goal line.
Sergi Barjuan’s beardless Barça went to rest without having fired a single shot between the three sticks, but with the feeling that he could play his rival face-to-face on the unpleasant night in Kiev, something that in his current situation it couldn’t be considered bad news.
The game’s script did not change after the restart, with Barça trying to take possession of the ball and impose its positional play and Dinamo looking to surprise their rival in the retreat to sow chaos in each transition.
In one of those counterattacks, Karavaev unsuccessfully searched for the visiting goal squad, when the game time was about to end.
The VAR reviewed – and canceled – a penalty that the referee had indicated on Ansu Fati, and Sergi sat Gavi to enter Dembélé, who returned to play an official match five months after suffering his umpteenth muscle injury.
Barça dominated again in this phase, and finally won the goal award. The defense deflected a Mingueza cross from the right and the ball fell in front of Ansu Fati, who finished violently into the back of the net from Bushchan’s goal with twenty minutes to go.
It was the third goal for the Spanish-Guinean this season and the second for the Catalans in this Champions League. A goal that would end up being worth gold.
But Lucescu’s team would not give up, far from it, in this final stretch. Sydorchuk and Tsygankov, Dinamo’s best player, put Ter Stegen to the test, shortly after, and Zabarnyi, a minute from the end, shot off a corner that would have been 1-1.
The verticality of Dembélé, very active in the minutes he was on the grass, appeared in the discount to serve a ball to Balde in a counter, but the Barça side crossed his shot too much, although Barça, in the end, would win the game . The first in which he achieved victory as a visitor this season.
– Data sheet:
0 – Dynamo Kiev: Bushchan; Kedziora (Tymchyk, min.77), Zabarnyi, Syrota, Karavaev; Sydorchuk, Shaparenko (Shepeliev, min.81); Tsygankov, Buyalskiy (Lednev, min.81), De Pena (Verbic, min.77); and Garmash (Vitinho, min.71).
1 – Barcelona: Ter Stegen; Mingueza, Lenglet (Araujo, min.79), Eric García, Jordi Alba; Sergio Busquets, Gavi (Dembélé, min.65), Nico, Frenkie de Jong; Ansu Fati (Balde, min.87) and Memphis.
Goals: 0-1: Ansu Fati, min. 70.
Referee: Ovidiu Haţegan (RUM). He showed a yellow card to Eric García (min.20), Garmash (min.41), Buyalskiy (min.45), Gavi (min.46) and Lenglet (min.50)
Incidents: Match of the fourth day of Group E of the Champions League played at the Olympic Stadium in Kiev, before 31,378 spectators. EFE (HN)