What happened in previous second legs after 0-0 draws at Camp Nou?

Barça are Galatasaray drew 0-0 in the first leg of their Europa League round of 16 tie. It’s only the fourth time that the first leg of a European fixture at Camp Nou has ended goalless. On one of those occasions the Catalans ended up progressing and on the other two they were eliminated. But with one important condition to bear in mind…

Three English cases

Curiously, all three previous examples were all against Premier League opposition and all happened in semi-finals, twice in the Champions League and once in the UEFA Cup.

On 19 April 2001, Barça travelled to Anfield after drawing 0-0 in the first leg of the UEFA Cup semi-final with Liverpool. The Reds would end up qualifying thanks to a Gary McAllister penalty on 44 minutes.

The other two examples were both in the Champions League. In the 2007/08 season, a a side captained by Xavi Hernández drew 0-0 with Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United. The Red Devils went on to qualify 1-0 on aggregate by winning the second leg at Old Trafford thanks to a solitary goal from Paul Scholes. 

The other case happened the very next season and was the only one of the three in which the blaugrana were the team to advance. Barça and Chelsea drew 0-0 at Camp Nou in the first leg of their semi-final. Everything was wide open for the return meeting at Stamford Bridge.

The game on 6 May 2009 has gone down in Barça folklore. The Blues led 1-0 going into the final minutes, and then Andrés Iniesta’s brilliant goal right at the end secured a 1-1 draw and meant the Catalans were on their way to the final in Rome.

The thing to bear in mind here, however, is that Barça won that tie on away goals, a rule that has since been scrapped. Under the current rules, that scenario would imply 30 minutes of extra time.