Luis Suarez and Neymar fired Barcelona to Uefa Champions League success as they defeated Juventus 3-1 in tonight’s final in Berlin.
Ivan Rakitic had given Barcelona an early lead only for Alvaro Morata to equalise in the second half, before Suarez and Neymar ensured the Catalan side won the competition for a fifth time in their history and a third time in the past seven years.
Juventus had hoped to frustrate Barcelona in the opening stages but that plan evaporated after only four minutes as Rakitic slotted home from close range after good work between Jordi Alba, Neymar and Andres Iniesta on the left.
Juventus were fortunate to not be further behind at the interval as they struggled to cope with Barcelona’s much vaunted forward line, with Gianluigi Buffon in the Juventus goal doing well to parry away an Iniesta drive.
He also pushed over a Suarez effort, with the former Liverpool man also firing just wide as Barcelona continued to open up the Serie A champions’ defence almost at will.
Barcelona started the second half as they had ended the first one with Suarez twice going close.
But the recently crowned Primera Liga champions were punished for their failure to add to their goal tally when Juventus found an equaliser 10 minutes after the restart.
Carlos Tevez was played in by Claudio Marchisio’s back heel, and the Argentine’s shot was blocked by Barcelona goalkeeper Marc-Andre ter Stegen, but Morata tapped in the rebound from close range.
This only seemed to stir Barcelona back to life and they went back in front through Suarez as he was first to react after Buffon had been unable to hold Lionel Messi’s shot.
Barcelona thought they had a third when Neymar’s header found the back of the net shortly afterwards.
However, the goal was correctly ruled out as officials had spotted the ball had gone in via Neymar’s hand, a decision that was met with considerable protestations by the Brazilian and his teammates.
But Neymar did score a third in stoppage time after being found in space by substitute Pedro to ensure Barcelona could celebrate their third trophy of 2015, to follow the Primera Liga and the Copa del Rey, at the final whistle.
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