Barcelona Avoids Blushes at Stuttgart

Just how slim of a chance did the odds-makers feel that Stuttgart had in its UEFA Champions League round of 16 match against defending competition champion Barcelona? The Catalonia giants were paying out as 1-to-10 favorites.

For the first 45 minutes Tuesday, the Southern German club looked like it might be able to spring a massive upset, leading 1-0 at the break.

But like so many matches, this turned out to be a tale of two halves, with Barcelona rallying to draw it 1-1 and take home a vital away goal to the Camp Nou in the return leg next month.

Stuttgart must have avoid reading how they had no chance at all to defeat the best club team in the world.

For the first 45 minutes Stuttgart thoroughly dominated, passing the ball around with ease and forcing Barcelona keeper Victor Valdes into numerous saves.

Stuttgart went ahead 1-0 in the 27th minute on a header from Cacau, who latched onto the end of a whicked cross from Timo Gebhart with a header at the back post. Cacau, a naturalized German via Brazil, entered the match after a four-goal explosion over the weekend against Cologne in a Bundesliga match.

From there Stuttgart kept the pressure on with a couple good chances. Cacau and strike partner Pavel Pogrebnyak made sure Barcelona didn't get any breathing room.

Despite being dominated, Barcelona nearly leveled in the first half when Lionel Messi beat Stuttgart keeper Jens Lehmann, but his shot rolled into the right post.

The second half, however, was a different story all together. Barcelona brought on Thierry Henry and became to look like the team that won just about every trophy in world soccer last season.

Barcelona took over and broke through to level in the 52nd minute. Zlatan Ibrahimovic fired a powerful shot inside the box that Lehmann made a nice effort to stop, but he couldn't corrall the rebound and the big Swede tapped it past him to make it 1-1. A much-maligned flop at Inter Milan, it was Ibrahimovic's first goal in the knockout rounds of the Champions League.

From there the match lost a little of the boil, with Barcelona maintaining most of the possession. Things did get a little chipper as the match progressed with Sami Khedira picking up a late yellow card after hacking down Messi on a Barcelona break.

Valdes did make an excellent reaction save late in the second half to smother a potential rebound that felt right in front of a Stuttgart player in the box.

Despite it looking dicey for the first 45 minutes, Barcelona will probably be pleased to return to Spain with the match even at 1-1.

In the other Champions League game Tuesday, Ligue 1 leading Bordeaux notched a 1-0 result in Greece against Olympiakos on a 45th-minute goal from Michael Ciani.