Following the first leg lead of Paris Saint-Germain 4 – 1 against Barcelona, the Spaniard team failed to fight for a comeback.
Lionel Messi, the six-time Golden Ball winner then had a penalty saved by goalkeeper Keylor Navas on the stroke of halftime, his first miss from the spot in the Champions League since 2015.
PSG lead 4-1 from the first leg of their round-of-16 game and moved four goals clear when Kylian Mbappe, who scored a hat trick at Camp Nou, netted with a confident penalty in the 31st minute.
However, Lionel Messi joined Cristiano Ronaldo in exiting the Champions League at the round of 16 stage.
English referee Anthony Taylor was at the heart of the drama, awarding contentious penalties to both sides in the first half. Kylian Mbappe gave the home side the lead from the spot but Messi missed with his effort shortly before half-time.
Messi’s departure from the competition means he may have played his last game in Europe for Barcelona, and also means that neither he nor Ronaldo will feature in the latter stages of the competition. Ronaldo’s Juventus were beaten by Porto on Tuesday.
Their coach Ronald Koeman will nevertheless be encouraged by the way his team played on a cold, wet and windy night at an empty Parc des Princes.
Barcelona have been a club in crisis for some time but they have a new president in Joan Laporta, who will hope to restore calm at boardroom level, and they can still hope to finish the season strongly domestically.
Mbappe’s early penalty made him, at the age of 22 years and 80 days, the youngest player in Champions League history to reach 25 goals in the competition. The record was previously held by Messi, who led the charge against Mauricio Pochettino’s side but was not helped by the wayward finishing of his team-mates.
