Everything that Barça has won so far this season falls into the category of minor titles, League, Copa del Rey, Super Cup, because the azulgarana team and Carlos Ortega, the coach, they are measured with a single yardstick: the Champions League. He is in the quarterfinals after finishing in the league, but as defending champion he has the obligation to be in the Final Four in Cologne again. Flensburg is the obstacle in the quarterfinals, and this Wednesday the first leg will be played in Germany (18:45, Esport3).
For Barça, the tie comes at a time when the team has been able to work focused on Europe, but with the loss of a fundamental player, because Fabregas is a man of attack and defense, and although he is already discharged, his appendicitis operation prevents him from disputing even the idea of the second leg of this tie. Ben Ali, the reinforcement pivot who arrived due to Frades’ injury, and who left Barça in June, will have to withstand the pressure with the help of Parera, from the second team.
Carlos Ortega knows that the Flens-Arena “is the most crowded track in Germany”, and although the match is 120 minutes away, “the team is not going to speculate; it is going to win.” This season they have already played twice, and both times the Catalan team won, and of the 12 meetings between the two, Barça has won 10, although the defeat in the 2014 semifinals hurts, the year Flensburg won the Champions League.
Ortega highlights Swedish central defender Jim Gottfridsson, the best player of the last European Championship, “who moves his team in the best way, and extends the attack”, and although He doesn’t talk about Wanne, the winger who will arrive at Barça in July, he is the German team’s top scorer, in which Moller, exporter of the Spanish team, already winner of the League, also acts, while Flensburg is third in the Bundesliga but very far from the leader, Magdebrurge.