Craziness at the Camp Nou

      Was Barcelona’s win the greatest comeback in Champions League history? The Catalan side’s chances of a three-goal recovery after 87 minutes? 0.1%

      The Camp Nou erupted. A late goal that turns the game around is enough to send any football crowd into raptures. But three? That was how many Barcelona required as the 90th minute approached on March 8th, in the second leg of a Champions League knockout tie against Paris Saint-Germain.

        The Catalan club had already been routed in the first leg, losing 4-0 in a poor performance away at the Parc des Princes on February 14th. Barça’s faint hopes of qualifying for the quarter-final were dampened further still by the away-goals rule: if the aggregate scores across the two legs are level at the end of the tie, the side which has bagged more goals away from home progresses. And sure enough, after the home side raced out to a 3-0 lead, Edinson Cavani, Paris Saint-Germain’s centre-forward, drove a volley into the roof of their net in the 62nd minute. That meant that Barcelona would have to beat them by five, leaving them three goals short with about half an hour to go. They failed to score any for the next 26 minutes.

        Only when the 88th minute arrived did the floodgates open. Neymar won a free-kick 30 yards from goal, and arrowed it into the top corner. Two minutes later Luis Suárez, who had already been booked for diving, went down in the box at the slightest of touches and won a penalty, which Neymar scored. Five minutes of injury time were added on. In the fifth Barcelona earned another free kick, won by their own goalkeeper in the opposition half, since everyone had piled forward in search of a winner. The ball was lobbed into the box, cleared, chipped in again by Neymar—and poked home by Sergi Roberto. The clock showed 94:40.The celebrations were quite literally recorded on local seismographs.

       Was this 6-1 victory the greatest escape in the history of the Champions League, the most prestigious tournament for European clubs—including the 38 years it was known as the European Cup? The answer depends on how one defines “greatest”. The simplest measure would be the size of a team′s lead after the first leg. By this figure, Barcelona′s accomplishment does indeed rank first: although eight clubs had previously reversed a three-goal disadvantage, none had come back from four.