Barça’s return to Wembley has opened the sports pages all around the world, with some names singled out for special praise (Abidal, Guardiola, Messi and Pedro) in a game that sent the club into its seventh final of Europe’s premier club competition. The French dailies applauded Barça’s football, and Italy’s ‘La Gazzetta dello Sport’ highlighted how the whole team contributed to getting to London, where the final will be a repeat of Rome 2009 against Man United.

Abidal, protagonist

‘L’Équipe’ opens by saying “the game wins”, with a photo of Messi dribbling the ball past Brazilian Kaká. The paper goes on to say that “there was no miracle” for Real Madrid on a night that Éric Abidal got “the ovation of the night from the Catalan supporters”. In similar fashion, ‘Le Parisien’ mentioned the return of the Frenchman and dedicated the headline in its sports section to its compatriot.

“The perfect storm”

In Britain, Barça’s win on a rain-sodden night was called “the perfect storm” highlighting how the bad weather couldn’t stop the Blaugrana from delighting the 95,701 spectators. The ‘Daily Mirror’ includes a multi-page section titled ‘The Road to Wembley’. ‘The Guardian’ tells of how “Barcelona hold off Real Madrid threat to reach Champions League final” and ‘The Times’ feels that FC Barcelona have made it less likely that José Mourinho will be returning to England.

‘The Sun’ warns Alex Ferguson, manager of Manchester United, who FCB are likely to be facing at Wembley, that “We’re coming to get you Man U”. The English papers already seem certain that the Red Devils will be playing in the final, and know that Barcelona is not just about Messi, but also Villa and Iniesta, who the ‘Daily Mirror’ scored the highest (8) in the game with Real Madrid.

Comparisons with Santos and Pelé

Argentina naturally focuses on Leo Messi. ‘Clarín’ reckons “Messi is going for more”, and sports paper ‘Olé’ mentions that “he didn’t score this time, but came close”, and highlights Guardiola’s comment about comparisons with Santos and Pelé: “Barcelona has Messi”. Pep was praised as far as China, where ‘Xinhua’ hailed his second final in three years.

“Miracles don’t exist”

Russia’s ‘Sport-Express’ spoke of the “impeccable pass” that Iniesta provided to Pedro to put Barça ahead in the 54th minute. Meanwhile, ‘Gazeta.ru’ tells how “miracles don’t exist” and says that although early on Madrid caused a threat to Valdés’ goal “they immediately lost strength”.