Barcelona's lucky escape and brutal margins - The 'what ifs' from Newcastle's UCL exit

A second-half collapse against Barcelona saw Newcastle United exit the Champions League in brutal fashion on Wednesday night, as the hosts ran out 7-2 winners (8-3 on aggregate). 

The scoreline on the night was pretty embarrassing, but when you consider just how much seemed to go against us over those two legs, did we really expect anything else?

As Olly wrote in the post-match report, Newcastle were competitive and fully in the tie for 75% of it; it was just that second half in Barcelona that let us down, with it feeling like we never recovered from Lamine Yamal's penalty just before the break.

It's easy to look back and pick apart that second-half performance, which was full of errors, cheap goals and so little quality the rare time we won the ball back. We could question, yet again, just what Eddie Howe says to his players at halftime to make them come out much less motivated than they were in the first half?

But honestly, another stoppage time sucker-punch, this time before the break, seemed to knock the players for six, and they just couldn't recover, as Howe admitted after the game.

Over the two ties and three hours of action over the past week, however, there has been plenty of 'what if' moments, showing that the fine margins play such a key role in a last 16 encounter that could so easily have been closer than 8-3 on aggregate.

Barca duo lucky to play last night

Last week at St James' Par, Lamine Yamal and Fermin Lopez somehow escaped yellow cards for fouls that, in any other game, would have seen them booked. Those bookings would have counted them out of the second leg. But what happened? The pair got away with it and BOTH scored, making it 3-2 (Yamal) and 4-2 (Lopez) to all but kill the tie.

Given just how influential Yamal was in almost every Barca goal, his absence would have made a massive difference. While it may not have made a difference,

Fermin Lopez repeated the exact same rugby tackle of a foul in last night's second leg, this time taking out Joelinton. The punishment? No yellow, again, ensuring he can now play in next month's quarter-final against Atletico Madrid

Penalties and punishing while on top

We can't complain about the penalty award at the end of the first half. It was a clear pull by Kieran Trippier, who knew exactly what he was doing.

What we will complain about, though, is how Anthony Elanga was pulled in the box before that, only for VAR to give it no more than a cursory glance before dismissing it.

There were other 'what if' moments from the spot, too, as you can't help but wonder how we would've got on tonight had our last-minute gift at St James' Park not handed Yamal the chance to make it 1-1 from the spot last Tuesday.

Of course, our second half collapse meant Barcelona ran away with the tie, winning it by a five-goal margin in the end. But I do think we'd have sat deeper, a little like we did at Chelsea, and looked to counter had we taken a 1-0 win to the Nou Camp last night.

One other 'what if' thought stems from how the two sides managed their moments on top. While Newcastle outplayed Barcelona for much of the home leg, we never put them to the sword, only having one goal to show from last Tuesday's outstanding display, despite periods of dominance.

In contrast, when Barcelona were on top back on home turf, they cut us open and made their star quality count. Where we had Barnes, Osula and Elanga in the first leg, with top scorer Gordon ill and on the bench, they had world class talent running riot in the second, as Raphinha, Lewandowski, Yamal and Lopez all ruthless in front of goal.

Conspiracies aside, Newcastle were masters of their own downfall

As much as we don't want to cry on about corruption and conspiracy theories about refereeing against us, sometimes things just seem weirdly stacked against us, and it's always against sides who wield far too much power in the football world.

At the end of the day, though, you can't go to the Camp Nou and defend like we did in the second half and not be punished for it. We really only have ourselves to blame.

On a night where we had to be almost perfectly defensively, we gifted Barcelona five of their seven goals. The man to man approach was brave, but it backfired in the end, while Thiaw's errors, Ramsey's giveaway and the concession of two set piece goals was unforgiveable at this level.

Next up, it's the big one against Sunderland, where the team owe us a huge performance on Sunday. In some quarters, the 'Howe Out' brigade are already in the starting blocks after last night; they're going to be everywhere if we fail to win in the derby.