Barcelona 2 - 1 Celtic: Immense Celtic hold Barca until the last cruel kick - SPL - Scotsman.com WE CAME here to admire the wizardry of Barcelona but ended up marvelling at the bravery of the team they were supposed to pummel. To a man, Celtic were immense. Beaten, but immense. Barcelona: Iniesta (45), Alba (90+4) Celtic: Samaras (18) Attendance: 75,000 Such was their level of commitment and concentration in the face of the marauders in their midst it's a wonder they didn't all collapse in a heap at the end. They would have been exhausted. Their bodies and their brains would have been hurting. And their hearts? God only knows what state they were in emotionally given the last act here, delivered like a kick to the Celtic groin in the fourth minute of injury time. Just when you thought they'd performed a feat of escapology that would have had Houdini himself tipping the cap in admiration, Barca nailed them. Out on the right, Adriano did his thing, whipping in a cross that sailed just over the head of Victor Wanyama and carried to the back post to Jordi Alba, the full-back, and hero, eluding James Forrest to tap in the winner that was riotously acclaimed by a home crowd that had been largely hushed and hugely frustrated up to that point. Barca tried everything to break Celtic and looked like they weren't going to do it. They had Messi and Iniesta and Xavi, they had Pedro and, off the bench, they had David Villa, too. None of them, seemingly, could find a winner. None of them could plot a way through the Celtic bodies who were laid on the line as if this was their last day on earth. When Villa hit a post in the dying minutes it looked the break of a lifetime but it was merely the prelude to the winner. Barca deserved it, no question. But this was also horribly cruel on Celtic. What we saw here until Alba sealed it was extraordinary, Celtic shaking the ground under the feet of their celebrated opponents. This was the natural order turned on its head, the impossible made possible, a suspected nightmare becoming the most vivid of dreams for a travelling support camped in the Gods and scarcely able to believe what was happening below them. We knew Celtic would be ten-acious and we also knew that their concentration levels would be high, their fear of a beating ensuring that they would be as disciplined, as organised and as hungry as they possibly could be. In all of these departments they outdid themselves. They hustled and harried, they got various parts of their bodies in the way of shots and passes and, yes, rode their luck, but they deserved to. How many times did the colossal Fraser Forster deny Barca? How many times did Efe Ambrose and Kelvin Wilson break up Barca's momentum with telling interventions? How many times did Charlie Mulgrew get himself in the way of things? How many times did Wanyama and Joe Ledley do likewise? We're talking big numbers here. Huge. As beautiful as Barca's play was at times there was a different kind of delight to be taken from the resistance they faced in return, not to mention shock and awe when Celtic came off the ropes to score the opener. The narrative before that first goal was just as we thought it would be. Barca had taken less than two minutes to carve out a terrific chance, Iniesta playing in Alexis Sanchez, who was preferred in attack ahead of Villa. Sanchez had a golden chance but he clipped his shot wide of Forster's right-hand post. Barca looked another gift horse in the mouth soon after, the blur of movement that was Messi and Iniesta manufacturing a moment that saw Marc Bartra, the 21-year-old centre-half making his first appearance of the season, presented with a header from point-blank range, a header he directed straight at Forster, who beat it away. In the minute that followed, this game erupted. Celtic's goal dropped out of the sky. You almost had to blink hard and look again to make sure that it had actually happened, that the underdogs available at odds of 33-1 and upwards had really taken the lead. The origins of it came with a Sanchez foul on Scott Brown and a Mulgrew free-kick that was whipped in from the right. In all the hours of research Neil Lennon would have done on Barca the genius of their play wouldn't have been the only thing he focused on. He would have seen their weakness in defence, too, where Carles Puyol and Gerard Pique have been absent these past weeks. With makeshift centre-halves, Barca have conceded ten goals in their past six games and here again their uncertainty cost them. Samaras climbed to meet Mulgrew's delivery and didn't have much in the way of a challenge from a defender, his flicked header connecting with Javier Mascherano's back before nestling in Victor Valdes's net. It was a gobsmacking moment. The tremors were felt all over the Nou Camp and soon the rhythm of the night was established. Barca would dominate possession, they would be clever and intricate, they would hold on to the ball like it was tied on a piece of string around their boots - and they would be frustrated. Messi had a couple of free-kicks that flew just too high and too wide. Bartra appeared in the Celtic box for a second time and, again, he made a mess of his moment, glancing a header wide when Forster was vulnerable. For Celtic, the key tackles came in waves. Tackles and blocks and nicks and flicks; anything and everything that shook Barca off their stride and messed with their momentum. Eventually, the equaliser came and there was nothing Celtic could do about it. It was Messi and then it was Iniesta, then Xavi and then Iniesta. Pass, pass, pass. Goal. Quite brilliant. It came at the end of the first half and you feared for Celtic at that point. It wasn't just their legs that would have been tired but their minds also. All that work, all that focus. They couldn't sustain it, could they? They could. Oh how they could. They had to do it without Samaras and Brown as well, the former going off injured just before the break, the latter just after. They left, but the spirit remained and it was embodied by Forster who made a string of superb saves, one from Sanchez and two from Messi who had got himself into such fantastic positions you would have bet your life on him scoring on both occasions. Forster was magnificent, but magnificence wasn't enough. Celtic retreated a beaten side, but a proud side for all that. Barcelona: Valdes, Adriano, Bartra, Mascherano, Jordi Alba, Xavi, Song, Iniesta, Sanchez (Villa 80), Messi, Pedro (Tello 76). Subs not used: Pinto, Fabregas, Jonathan, Montoya, Sergi Roberto. Booked: Mascherano, Adriano Celtic: Forster, Lustig, Wilson, Ambrose, Izaguirre, Samaras (Forrest 43), Brown (Commons 63), Wanyama, Ledley, Mulgrew (Kayal 76), Hooper. Subs Not Used: Zaluska, Matthews, Miku, Rogne