FC Barcelona vs SS Lazio Tickets

Barcelona’s fanbase is as large as it is global. Supporters from all corners of the globe dream of seeing the Blaugrana do battle, and to do so when they are competing in the UEFA Champions League is the ultimate bucket list item for any fan of the Catalan side.

Getting hold of tickets is no easy feat, not least because season ticket holders and club members take up much of the stadium, but via SeatPick, you’ll have the best chance of making your footballing dreams come true.

FC Barcelona have won a total of 17 major UEFA trophies over the course of their rich history, and five of these have come on the biggest stage of them all.

It was Johan Cruyff who led the team to their first title, the Dutch master having spent five productive years playing for the club in the 1970s. That first win came against Sampdoria at Wembley Stadium when fellow Dutchman Ronald Koeman crashed home a quality free-kick in extra time.

Cruyff had managed Barcelona during a key period of domestic dominance prior to the European Cup success, winning La Liga four years in a row.

Two years after the victory over Sampdoria, he took Barca to the European Cup Final again, but on this occasion, they were no match for AC Milan, with Fabio Capello’s side winning 4-0 in Athens.

The UEFA Champions League, the rebranded successor to the European Cup, proved a more successful competition for Barcelona.

They first won it in 2006 by beating ten-man Arsenal in Paris before a Lionel Messi-led footballing revolution swept aside all before them.

Under boss Pep Guardiola, the tiki-taka style of play adopted by Barcelona proved unstoppable, and their 2009 UEFA Champions League Final win over Manchester United in Rome was the culmination of this stylistic switch.

By 2011, Guardiola’s side were near unbeatable, and they saw off Sir Alex Ferguson’s side again, this time at Wembley Stadium, in a powerful 3-1 win.

Luis Enrique picked up where Guardiola left off, and with a front line of Messi, Neymar, and Luis Suarez, few defences could offer much resistance. 2015 saw Barcelona easily beat Juventus in the UEFA Champions League Final, but for the next seven seasons, the team has somewhat failed to get close to such heights.

Nonetheless, a team as monumental as Barcelona can’t be kept at bay for too long, so one imagines a sixth top-tier European crown is only just around the corner.

Stadio Olimpico side Lazio haven’t had the best of times in the UEFA Champions League; indeed, the first time they qualified for the tournament was only relatively recently, in 1999/2000, though on that occasion, they did well to reach the Quarter-Finals before being beaten by eventual losing finalists Valencia.

They subsequently qualified for the tournament for three of the next four seasons, on each occasion failing to get to the knockout phase. That run of relative failure came to an end in 2020/21 when the Rome-based side got to the Round of 16, only to be beaten 6-2 on aggregate by Bayern Munich.

FC Barcelona vs SS Lazio Head-to-Head

FC Barcelona and Lazio have met on one previous occasion in Europe, and that came in the 1975/76 UEFA Cup Second Round.

The first leg of the game was canceled after Lazio refused to play due to political demonstrations; this meant the game was awarded as a 3-0 win to Barcelona. The second leg finished 4-0 to the home side, with Johan Cruyff and fellow Dutchman Johan Neeskens among the goalscorers.

FC Barcelona vs SS Lazio Connections

A few players have represented both Barcelona and Lazio, including popular midfielder Ivan de la Pena, who spent three years at Camp Nou before moving to Italy in 1998, where he won the UEFA European Cup Winners’ Cup.

Portuguese international Fernando Couto also represented both teams, as did Keita Balde, Patric, and Gaizka Mendieta.

Perhaps the most celebrated player to play for both teams comes in the form of Danish playmaker Michael Laudrup.

The cultured midfielder moved to Lazio from Brondby in 1983 and spent two years in the Italian capital, scoring 12 goals in 70 games before joining Juventus. After a successful four-season spell in Turin, Laudrup was lured to Barcelona.

In five seasons at Camp Nou, he made 217 appearances and scored 55 times, and in all but one season, he lifted the La Liga title and also played a crucial role in their European Cup success of 1992.

Laudrup then made the contentious switch to arch-rivals Real Madrid in 1994 after he fell out with manager Johan Cruyff.