Barcelona and Spurs... the story so far

Despite our long association with European football stretching right back to our first-ever appearance in the 1961/62 European Cup, it’s somewhat surprising that we had only met Barcelona once in competitive action prior to our Champions League matchday two meeting at Wembley in October.

It came in the semi-finals of the 1981/82 European Cup Winners’ Cup, which we’d qualified for courtesy of our FA Cup triumph the previous season. This was our first appearance in Europe since losing the 1974 UEFA Cup Final to Feyenoord.

White Hart Lane was the venue for the first leg on 7 April, 1982, and it would be fair to say the game wasn’t pretty. We were renowned at the time for a free-flowing style of football under Keith Burkinshaw and were certainly tough to beat on our own patch, so Barcelona did their best to prevent us playing our usual game. Dutch referee Egbert Mulder could have taken action long before he sent off Juan Estella in the 57th minute but, even though they were reduced to 10 men, Barcelona made the breakthrough, Antonio Olmo’s long-range effort slipping through the grasp of Ray Clemence to give the Catalans a vital away goal.

We weren’t to be denied on the night though and levelled with five minutes remaining thanks to Graham Roberts, who side-footed home Glenn Hoddle’s free-kick from close range. It was no more than we deserved and gave us a lifeline heading to Spain for the return leg.

Two weeks later we reconvened at the Nou Camp and we approached the game confident of pulling off the result we needed to reach the final. But the match proved to be a step too far, coming at the end of a gruelling fixture backlog caused by the harsh winter which finally caught up with us. We looked a little jaded on the night but still produced a valiant display, the only thing missing being that vital away goal.

As it was, Barcelona scored the only goal of the game a minute into the second half when Danish striker Allan Simonsen stabbed home after Quini’s header had looped into the area. A floodlight failure midway through the first half probably didn’t help our cause.

Although we’d met Barcelona twice in pre-season action in the intervening years – drawing 1-1 (Jake Livermore) in the Wembley Cup in July, 2009, and then recovering from two goals down to draw 2-2 (Heung-Min Son, Georges-Kevin Nkoudou) before losing 5-3 on penalties in the International Champions Cup at the famous Rose Bowl in Los Angeles this past summer – we had to wait until 3 October this year to play the European powerhouses in a competitive tie again.

A battling and spirited performance went unrewarded at Wembley as the visitors just had too much for us in the final reckoning, claiming a 4-2 win on matchday two of this current Champions League campaign.

Missing five first team regulars – Dele Alli, Mousa Dembele, Christian Eriksen, Serge Aurier and Jan Vertonghen – through injury and on the back foot from the moment we conceded in the second minute, we showed real courage and desire to push our illustrious visitors all the way, Lionel Messi’s 89th-minute goal finally taking the sting out of our endeavours and sealing their victory.

Philippe Coutinho was the beneficiary of Barca’s early strike, added to by a stunning strike from Ivan Rakitic before Harry Kane produced a moment of magic of his own to halve the deficit seven minutes after half-time. Messi then made it 3-1, but Erik Lamela’s deflected 66th-minute effort brought us back into contention once more and we pushed the La Liga side all the way until their Argentine star settled the outcome.