Pep Guardiola is headed home to visit lionel Messi and his Barcelona teammates in the Champions league semi-finals.
The current Bayern Munich coach, who led Barcelona to 14 titles before heading to Germany and helped win more as a player, will face his old team in the first leg on Wednesday at Camp Nou.
Messi and luis Enrique, who calls Guardiola his “friend,” both said on Tuesday that the chance of reaching a European final was a greater motivation that facing the man already considered a club great.
“With Guardiola, besides the titles, which are the most important thing, I grew and learned a lot as a player,” Messi said. “He knows us, and we know what he wants and asks of his team. It’s 50-50, we all know each other very well.”
Here are some things to know about Wednesday’s match:
OBSESSION WITH POSSESSION
No other coach besides former Real Madrid nemesis Jose Mourinho has left his mark on European soccer like Guardiola, who perfected Barcelona’s passing style and implanted it at Bayern.
The possession-based approach has often worked, but when it hasn’t led to titles it has earned Guardiola the criticism of being more interested with having the ball than putting it in the net.
The arrival of luis Enrique to coach Barcelona, and, equally important, that of luis Suarez to provide a traditional striker up front, has let Barcelona finally vary its tactics, which had atrophied since Guardiola left. Barcelona can now win through set pieces and long balls for Suarez, something rarely seen over the past decade at Camp Nou.
Barcelona and Bayern lead the four teams left in the competition in passing, with an eerily equal completion rate of 91 percent. Barcelona has made 6,308 total passes compared to 6,230 for Bayern. “I don’t think Pep has any doubts about what we will do,” luis Enrique said. “He knows the players, and he knows me as a coach because I was with the “B’’ team when he was here.
“It will depend on who is more precise and responds better to given situations. We are both teams that need the ball to attack and defend. I think this will be one of the most attractive matches to see in Europe.”
100 PERCENT MESSI
Barcelona’s only loss in its last 32 Champions league matches at home came against Bayern in 2013, when the German side beat the hosts 3-0 to win 7-0 on aggregate in the semifinals before winning its fifth European Cup.
MASKED lEWANDOWSKI
Bayern is hoping striker Robert lewandowski will be able to play with a special mask.
lewandowski, who suffered a concussion and fractures in his upper jaw and nasal bone in the German Cup semi-final loss to Borussia Dortmund a week ago, traveled with the team on Tuesday morning. A bigger problem may be his shoulder and a bruised rib that are leaving the striker in pain.
In addition to long-term injures to Arjen Robben and Franck Ribery, Bayern will also miss Sebastian Rode.
lIMIT THE DAMAGE
Bayern’s plan for the first leg will be to try to limit the damage. The injury-depleted Bayern team is clearly placing its bets on the return leg in Munich next week.
“The semi-final must not be decided already in Barcelona,” Bayern chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge said. “Ideally, we should score a goal and try not to lose, or at least lose by a close score. I would sign immediately under a 2-1 defeat.”