WOULD YOU ADAM AND BELIEVE IT ?

Fernando Torres scores against Barça to send Gary Neville into raptures and Chelsea to Champions League final

When Gary Neville, finally, hung up his boots last year and announced he was to become a football pundit for Sky Sports few predicted that the former Manchester United full-back would earn a place in our hearts for his honest, informative and occasionally witty commentary.

What is it about Chelsea and the world’s best footballer? For an eighth time, Messi failed to score against them, twice striking the frame of that goal on which the angel apparently perched.

' THIS BLOWS '

Add to that a yellow card, an angry reaction to Frank Lampard’s challenge on Cesc Fabregas — a flash of temper for a second successive match given his reaction in El Clasico last Saturday — and even the fact that it was Messi who had lost possession in the first leg to eventually allow Didier Drogba to score.



It is some strange mix for the Argentinean who has now gone an astonishing, for him, four hours and 48 minutes without a goal. It appears a lifetime given the freedom, the joy with how he has scored so prodigiously and innovatively throughout this campaign in particular.

What was almost as puzzling last night was how belief seemed to drain from Messi once he missed that penalty. It just didn’t look like he felt it could happened for him; that his powers were diminished.

How quickly things can unravel. The Barcelona coach Pep Guardiola appeared on edge on the eve of this encounter and now, perhaps, his career at the club is on a knife-edge. Barcelona didn’t lose last night, but it felt like a defeat.

Guardiola has faced 52 different teams since succeeding Frank Rijkaard and Chelsea are the only one he has not beaten, although a scoring draw at Stamford Bridge in 2009 was enough to eliminate them.