Borussia Dortmund v FC Barcelona: Did you know?

This Wednesday at 9pm CET, FC Barcelona are in action at the Westfalenstadion, home of Borussia Dortmund, who are currently fourth in the UEFA Champions League. Here are five particularly important things that all fans will want to know ahead of the match. 

27 November 2019. That was the date when these sides last faced off, a home win for Barça, 3-1 with goals from Luis Suárez, Leo Messi and Antoine Griezmann. Other than the two games played in the group stage of the competition that year (the other was a 0-0 draw), the only other competitive clash between the sides was in the European Super Cup of 1997, which also resulted in a draw and a Barça win.

Barça are looking to win their fifth consecutive game in the competition, and if they were to do it by three goals or more, they will have done that for the fifth time in a row, equalling the achievement of 2020/21 and making them the only club to have managed the feat twice. 

The Brazilian has had more attempts on goal (20) and also created more chances (15) than any other player in this edition of the Champions League. That's 4.5 shots and 3.3 chances per game. The only Barça player to have bettered those stats in one season of the Champions League was Lionel Messi (6.2 shots and 3.8 chances).

Like Barça, Dortmund have won four of their five games played to date in the competition. That puts them one win away from the five out of six that they got in 1997/98, the year they went on to become champions. And their 16 goals is the second highest count in the competition, topped only by Barça with 18. 

The Barça striker once played for Borussia Dortmund, but he hasn't been too kind to them since he left, scoring more goals against them than any other team, a staggering 27 goals in 26 meetings. He has scored in his last five games against them (9 goals in total). But Dortmund have a dangerman in their ranks too. Serhou Guirassy has scored four goals and given two assists in this year's Champions League.