Bayern Munich defender Jerome Boateng has admitted his side could not control Lionel Messi in their 3-0 Champions League defeat at the Camp Nou.
The Catalans are now firm favourites to progress to the final in Berlin after their last four victory and Boateng conceded it had been a bad night for the Bundesliga outfit.
“Barcelona certainly had more of the game but we matched them for 70 minutes,” he told the DFB.de website.
“We made mistakes and conceded unnecessary goals when we were too far apart, and that shouldn’t happen.
“However, we couldn’t keep Lionel Messi out of the game for 90 minutes. You can’t keep tabs on such a quality individual.
“You can only manage to reduce their threat as a team and, as shown in the closing stages, that takes it out of you.
“We did really well to limit his influence for most of the game but then you have to continue defending as a team.
“After falling behind, which shouldn’t have occurred in the first place, you can’t allow the other team to increase their advantage.
“If you concede then you can’t let the opposition grab a second and a third so easily.”
The 26-year-old then looked ahead to next week’s second leg at the Allianz Arena.
“We need to stand together as a team and try and win the return leg. It’s a real shame and disappointing we lost 3-0 after putting in such a solid performance for 70 minutes.
“We’d certainly like to overturn the deficit. However, this is Barcelona we are talking about and they’re a different team to all the others.
“Even so, we’ve nothing to lose and need to throw everything we’ve got at them to turn it around.
“If we have the right approach then we perhaps have a glimmer of hope, but obviously it’ll be extremely tricky. It’s different to the deficit we had against Porto,” he maintained.
