Messi and Benzema face to face in Champions League

February 24, 2009

Two of the world brightest young players and the players that their respective countries will be hoping lead their team to glory in next year’s 2010 World Cup clash tonight in the Champions League. Barceloans Lionel Messi and Lyons Karim Benzema both have 5 goals in this year’s competition and sit joint top with Steven Gerrard and Miroslav Klose.

Argentine ace Messi likes coming up against the seven-time French champions.

Last season, he scored in both group games which finished 2-2 in France and a comfortable 3-0 win in Barcelona as the Spanish giants, twice European champions, made it as far as the semi-finals.

However, Barcelona did not have the best preparation for Tuesday’s clash, losing 2-1 to city rivals Espanyol. It was their first defeat since the opening day of the season, ending a 22-match unbeaten run.

“Nobody said this was going to be easy,” said Barcelona coach Pep Guardiola. “It was a demanding match and we need our players to recover from it.”

Like Barcelona, Lyon are on top of their domestic league, but coach Claude Puel believes his side have the toughest assignment of the entire Champions Legaue second round draw.

“It?s the most difficult draw we could have faced, given that Barcelona is the best team in the world at the moment,” said Puel.

“It?ll be difficult for us, but I think we have a chance if we play as a team and produce good football. Barcelona have some great individual players, but we have a great team.

“We can produce some great football, and we need to play as a team in order to win.”

Lyon, for whom the sought-after Benzema hit his 12th league goal of the season in Saturday’s 2-0 win over Nancy, will need to shore up a leaky defence having conceded ten goals in the group stage, more than any other side left in the last 16.

In stark contrast, no other team scored as many goals as Barcelona in the group stage with 18 in six matches.

Barcelona will be without French international defender Eric Abidal, a former Lyon star, for the both legs of the tie after injuring his leg in Saturday’s defeat.

Barcelona paid Lyon 15 million euros for Abidal in June 2007 after the player made his mark for France at the 2006 World Cup finals.

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