Chelsea And Barcelona Engage In Champions League Banter Ahead Of Friendly

Chelsea and Barcelona meet on Tuesday morning in a pre season friendly but it's not as friendly as usual with the two sides taking digs at each other over the Champions League.

Pre season fixtures throw up all sorts of matches that we're more used to seeing in the latter half of a Champions League campaign and Chelsea's game with Barcelona on Tuesday in Japan is no different.

The Blues wanted to tie in the match with a bit of history and posted a tweet with highlights of their famous semi-final victory from the European competition in 2012:

Chelsea weren't in the Champions League last season, after finishing fifth in the Premier League in the 2017/18 season, a fact Barcelona were all too ready to mock them about:

But taking the rivalry to the next step Chelsea's USA account, which is probably gutted the match isn't taking place closer to its home, reminded the Spanish side of their collapse this season, losing 4-0 to Liverpool in the second leg, having lead 3-0 after the first:

In fact going all the way back to their semi final encounter seven years ago there's a recent history for the Spanish champions of throwing away a lead.

They lead 2-0 in 2012 and the Blues had captain John Terry sent off but Ramires' goal at the end of the first half and Fernando Torres' goal in second half injury time took the English side through.

In 2016 they won the first leg of their quarter final 2-1 against Atletico Madrid but Diego Simeone's side won the second leg 2-0.

But the last two years is where comebacks have really haunted them. The Catalan giants have twice led by three goals after first legs only to be knocked out.

In 2018 they led 4-1 in the quarter final against Roma, only to lost 3-0 in Italy and earlier this year they lost against Liverpool 4-0 in the second leg of their semi final at Anfield, having won 3-0 at home.

Chelsea may have not been in the competition last season but by finishing third in the league and winning the Europa League they'll be back in it next season.

Frank Lampard might fancy seeing his old playing opponents later on in the tournament.

Topics: Football News, Chelsea, Barcelona, Premier League, friendly, Champions League, Twitter, Football twitter, La Liga

Ryan Sidle

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