MESSI and TEVEZ, two gladiators going to Rome

TEVEZ saw from the bench on Tuesday how his (soon-to-be-former-club?) Manchester United reached their second consecutive Champions League.

On Wednesday, Lionel MESSI had to endure almost 94 minutes of constant suffering before dishing out a cool assist for INIESTA to burn down Stamford Bridge and send FC Barcelona to the all important May 27 match at the Stadio Olimpico of Rome.

Two of the most iconic and popular Argentine players these days will meet up in what promises to be one of the most incredible Champions League finals in recent years.

TEVEZ is not enjoying a whole lot of starts for Manchester United this season. BERBATOV's arrival reduced TEVEZ's minutes to a minimum, but that probably wasn't the reason why Carlitos had to wait on the bench at the Emirates Stadium. Remember he played, and quite well, in the first leg against Arsenal at Old Trafford.

Sir Alex FERGUSON played TEVEZ from the start and the Apache successfully took the first penalty in the shoot-out against Chelsea.

My gut feeling is FERGUSON will play him again. FERGUSON knows better than anyone, that TEVEZ gives him an edge when it comes to play finals or important matches. That's a story to discuss in the next few days, not now.

Because what's fresh now is what happened in London on Wednesday night.

Chelsea made it clear from the game's first action, when one of their players (can't remember exactly who was that) kicked the ball high into the night and towards Víctor VALDES' box. They didn't care about being looked at as a negative team, playing negative football. They went for the result. They almost got away with it, when thanks to a lucky rebound in Yaya TOURE's leg, ESSIEN scored an incredible goal after the ball bounced off the bar.

From that moment on, I knew Barcelona were in trouble. No HENRY (injured). No PUYOL (suspended). No MARQUEZ (injured). GUARDIOLA had to move around some players and use TOURE as an improvised centre back (I wonder what grade his brother Kolo would give him for his performance!). INIESTA played almost as a left winger and youngster Sergio BUSQUETS had the difficult task of playing as a central midfielder.

Chelsea were superb at closing every avenue, every road and every little hole for Barcelona. I believe Chelsea started playing a little bit more after Eric ABIDAL saw the red card for a foul on ANELKA. I thought they were starting to deserve it a little bit more.

I remember at half-time thinking..."If I had the chance to write a script of how I want this 'movie' to be, I'd want Chelsea to start dominating clearly. To start wasting chances. I'd want Barcelona to be reduced to 10-men. I'd want them to stink the whole second half and then...when everything looked done and dusted, scored on injury time through a John TERRY's own goal".

Well...the only thing that didn't happen just as I imagined it was that TERRY didn't score past Petr CECH, but apart from that, everything seemed to be a part of that imaginary movie I pictured inside my head.

When Dani ALVES (who had a very bad game in my opinion) received the ball with injury-time ticking away, I even said to my self: "If Barcelona scores in this one, I'll shout as much as I shouted when Maxi RODRIGUEZ scored against Mexico on entra-time".

Then Bojan didn't quite reach the ball, ETO'O couldn't control it as he would have wanted to, ESSIEN failed to clear and the ball fell to MESSI. What did he do? As it's been a constant during the previous 180 minutes, he had three men on him. ESSIEN, ALEX and there was another, I think it was BOSINGWA. He controlled the ball, attracted all those men and calmly sent the ball towards INIESTA, who was waiting for an opportunity to shoot. And shoot he did! It was Barcelona's only shot on target in the evening and it meant the world to them.

It meant a lot to me too. Regardless of my feelings towards Barcelona and Chelsea, I was supporting Barcelona with all my energies because of the kind of football they represent. I was against Chelsea for having one of the richest squads in the world and refusing to play football.

Yes, the referee failed to see two clear penalties for Chelsea (and another one that was very dubious). Yes, Chelsea fans will start going on and on about that and the theory that Michel PLATINI doesn't want English teams to dominate like they are doing in recent years. They probably have a point in the first argument, not so much in the second (the way I see things).

I think the bottomline is they approached the game as if they were a team with no world-class players going against a superior side. I would accept that kind of approach from a lower league team or a relegation struggler when facing a big team. I even had no complaints when they went to the Camp Nou with a similar tactic. Tonight, they only showed some flashes of dominance when Barcelona were reduced to 10 men, but they failed to seal the result. One goal, against a team that scored more than 100 this season (only in La Liga), is not a safe margin and I think the team that wanted it the most, was the one who advanced.

I was rooting for a chance to see a Champions League final that would give us the chance to see MESSI and TEVEZ. To see another round in the fight between MESSI and Cristiano RONALDO to see who's the best in the world.

Now we will see it.