Barcelona's Champions League hopes took successful on Sunday night when they have been held with the aid of Espanyol inside the Barcelona derby. It looked it would be a routine Barca win when Pedri gave Barca the lead inside the establishing minutes, however Sergi Darder levelled simply before the interval and Raul de Tomas struck inside the 64th minute rapidly after Barca had a goal dominated out via VAR. Then, after each teams had had a participant despatched off, Luuk de Jong headed in Traore's pass to get Barca the draw. The end result sees Xavi's guys in fourth beforehand of Atletico Madrid on intention distinction while Espanyol are thirteenth, eight factors above the drop region.
Barcelona were given off to the suitable start in the city derby with simply two mins on the clock when Pedri gave them the lead. Jordi Alba picked out the youngster at the a ways publish and Pedri beat Diego Lopez to put Barca ahead in the front of a active home crowd.
After the aim, the game started out to end up a chunk tough with demanding situations flying in and a definite part to the competition. However, the tension then decreased and Barcelona commenced to play the higher football. However, there were few clear cut probabilities. Espanyol pressed, however stored on being flagged offside and it seemed it would be zero-1 on the smash. However, the game then livened up.
Adama Traore had a glorious danger to double Barca's gain after he were given at the quit of a lovely move via Gavi, but his strike turned into well saved via Diego Lopez in the Espanyol aim. Minutes later, Espanyol have been level. Raul de Tomas acquired the ball within the Barcelona place, but became below stress from Araujo so he grew to become and laid off to Sergi Darder, whose curling effort deflected off Pedri and went into the back of the net. Espanyol then finished the half of more potent and it turned into all degree at the interval.
Eric Garcia got here on for Ronald Araujo at half-time and there has been a fast tempo to the opening mins of the second one length. Barca thought that they had hit the front simply before the hour mark after Gavi had scored in scrappy style, but the VAR detected that Frenkie de Jong changed into offside within the building up and it became chalked off.
Frenkie De Jong changed into taken off a couple of minutes and new signing Aubameyang become added on by Xavi to try to get the all vital winner for the away side, but things surely got worse for Barca in the sixty fourth minute. Darder performed a excellent skip ahead for Raul de Tomas, who controlled and then beat Ter Stegen to make it 2-1 to Espanyol.
Ousmane Dembele was also added on with simply over 15 mins, however Barca had few chances. The referee become forced to open his pocket book a few times as Barca's frustration were given the higher of them and it turned into definitely Espanyol who seemed more likely to attain.
Luuk de Jong became introduced on for the final ranges and he very nearly scored within the six mins of added time. Dembele positioned a pass into the box and he headed over. There was still time for the game to finish ten a side as a combat broke out between Gerard Pique and Nico Melamed and each players were given their marching orders. Then, with almost the final kick of the sport, Luuk de Jong were given his head to Adama Traore's go to interrupt Espanyol's hearts and get Barcelona a late factor which takes them into the pinnacle four.
