Barça on brink of European exit

FC Barcelona requires a Champions League miracle. Fortunately, it has the man to provide one, Lionel "Messiah" Messi himself, and stand-in coach Jordi Roura duly rested his star man in the side's pedestrian 2-0 win over Deportivo on Saturday. Messi did take the field late in the match and scored a dinked effort that maybe five or six other players in the world could have pulled off.

Unfortunately for Barcelona, two of those players currently ply their trade at AC Milan, which enjoyed a huge slice of luck and a piece of sublime skill to carve out a 2-0 lead in the tie at San Siro. Kevin-Prince Boateng, one of the aforementioned players, opened the scoring after a clear handball in the build-up, before Stephan El Shaarawy, the second aforementioned ball-charmer, provided a glorious assist for Sulley Muntari to smash past Víctor Valdés.

Milan suffers from not being as good as Milan was - no side has achieved the feat of back-to-back European Cup victories since the great Arrigo Sacchi side that claimed the 1989 and 1990 titles. But this current Milan is certainly better than it has been in recent years, and has brought down the squad's average age from approaching 40 to 27.4 years old.

Galliani: "Messi is a monster. We hope he takes a day off"

The task facing Barcelona on Tuesday (8.45pm, TVE-1) should not be underestimated; no team in Champions League history has ever gone through after a 2-0 first-leg away defeat. If Milan scores in Camp Nou, Barcelona will need four. If Milan again scores twice, the home side will need to bag five. In either case, Roura's side will need to chance its arm a little more in front of goal: in the first leg, despite having 70-percent possession, Barcelona mustered just one shot on target.

"Messi is a monster," noted Milan vice president Adriano Galliani on Monday. "He scores with incredible frequency. We hope that tomorrow he takes a day off. We are playing against the best team in the world."

"The key is finding the balance between intensity, pressure, effort, strength and enthusiasm," said Roura. "At the end of the day two goals can take a long time or a short time to come, and we mustn't lose our heads."

Málaga, in its first ever knock-out tie in Europe's elite club competition, was utterly outplayed by Porto but managed to escape the dragon's lair with only one goal conceded - a result that represented a victory in itself. On only four occasions has a 1-0 away loss been overturned in the second leg in the Champions League.

Much like Barcelona, Manuel Pellegrini's team failed to warm the gloves of Helton Arruda in the Porto goal as its star players, Joaquín, Isco and Roque Santa Cruz, were nullified by Porto's superior midfield. The bright spot for Pellegrini's team is that its defense was able to contain the attacking verve of Colombian tricksters Jackson Martínez and James Rodríguez and in fact only conceded to João Moutinho's offside strike.

In good news for Málaga, its top Champions League scorer Eliseu Pereira should be fit to play when La Rosaleda welcomes Porto on Wednesday night (8:45pm, C+ Liga C). The Portuguese side as a club trumps the Spaniards in terms of European experience, with several Champions League and Uefa Cup campaigns under its belt and the titles in both competitions, the last as recently as 2011.

Málaga, though, also boasts individuals who have played at the highest level and with one of the more vociferous fan bases in Spain behind it, the south coast club is capable of extending its maiden run in the tournament.