Benfica vs Barcelona 0-1 All Goals & Extended Highlights | Champions League 2024/25 (Video)

Barcelona are off to a good start in the Champions League knockout stage thanks to a hard-fought 1-0 win away to Benfica at the Estádio da Luz in the first leg of their Round of 16 tie on Wednesday night. Barça had to play the final 70 minutes with 10 men after Pau Cubarsí’s early red card, but Hansi Flick’s men showed remarkable resilience to resist Benfica’s pressure and Champions League Raphinha showed up again in a big European night and scored the winner to give Barça a huge result to take back home for next week’s second leg.

FIRST HALF

Benfica looked to make another fast start just like they did in their first meeting back in January and almost scored after 25 seconds when Aktürkoglu fired a shot looking for the corner, but Wojciech Szczesny made an amazing save for the visitors.

After surviving the (very) early scare Barça began to dominate possession and control the tempo of the game, with Frenkie de Jong and Pedri getting on the ball as often as possible to force Benfica to abandon their press and defend deep inside their half. Lamine Yamal looked a threat early on, and Barça created a huge chance that required an amazing triple save by Trubin against Yamal and Robert Lewandowski