We look ahead to the first leg of this UEFA Women’s Champions League semi-final at the Estadi Johan Cruyff with our Barcelona vs Chelsea prediction and preview.
Barcelona vs Chelsea Stats: The Key Insights
Barcelona are backed to build a first-leg advantage by the Opta supercomputer, after being handed a win probability of 49.5%. Barça are aiming to reach the final of the UEFA Women’s Champions League for the fifth straight season, with Lyon between 2015-16 and 2019-20 the only previous team to achieve that feat. This is the third consecutive season in which Chelsea and Barcelona are meeting in the semi-finals of the competition.Sunday’s UEFA Women’s Champions League matchup between Chelsea and Barcelona will be a meeting of familiar faces.
This will be their third consecutive semi-final clash, with Barça winning the last two. No side have eliminated Chelsea from the competition more often than the Catalan giants, who also beat them in the 2021 final (Wolfsburg also three).
Under previous manager Emma Hayes, Chelsea seemingly found Barcelona to be their Kryptonite, while the semi-final hurdle was one they often struggled to overcome.
Among teams to have competed in at least five UWCL semi-final ties, only Arsenal (14% – 1/7) have a worse progression rate than Chelsea (20% – 1/5), whose only victory at this stage came against Bayern Munich in 2020-21.
However, under Sonia Bompastor – a serial Champions league winner both as a player and a coach – Chelsea are confident of breaking the cycle in this season’s competition.
They will hope Bompastor’s presence is a major factor, as she is the only coach to have beaten Barcelona in the competition in the last four years, leading Lyon to victory in the 2022 final on a magical night in Turin.
Chelsea have won seven of their eight UWCL games this season (L1), their most victories in a single campaign.
Barcelona, however, have become one of the most dominant sides in world football, completing the quadruple last season. They are also the only team to reach the semi-finals of the competition in each of the last seven campaigns (since 2018-19).
They have also seen changes this season, with Pere Romeu continuing to build on the legacy of Jonatan Giráldez. Barcelona have won their last 17 two-legged UWCL ties, a run that began in 2018, and Romeu is the fourth manager to contribute to it.
They have, however, shown they can be beaten in both the league and in Europe this season. Most notably, they were defeated 3-1 by Real Madrid, their first ever defeat in El Clásico following 18 straight wins over their rivals.
They also suffered a 2-1 defeat to Manchester City in the group stage of this competition, the same opponents who dealt Chelsea their only loss in Europe this season in the first leg of the quarter-finals.
Since losing the 2022 final to Lyon, Barcelona have won 10 of their 12 games in the knockout stages of the competition (D1 L1). They have won each of their last seven UWCL games, their longest run since between May 2021 and April 2022 (11 in a row).
Barça are the leading scorers in this season’s tournament with 36 goals, and eight of those have come via players aged 21 or younger – the most since Paris Saint-Germain in 2021-22 (nine).
Chelsea will be aware of the threat of Caroline Graham Hansen, as no player has scored more goals against the Blues in the competition her four (level with Tabea Sellner). The winger scored against Chelsea in the 2021 final and both legs of the 2022-23 semi-finals with Barça, as well as the 2015-16 round of 16 when playing for Wolfsburg.
Leading the Golden Boot race with seven goals in this edition is Clàudia Pina. Her goals have come from 2.9 expected goals, giving her a +4.1 xG overperformance – she has scored four more goals than would have been anticipated based on the quality of chances she has had.
Pina (36.8%) also has the second-best shot conversion rate of any player in the competition this season to have scored more than two goals, after Arsenal’s Mariona Caldentey (41.7%).
Chelsea will also need to shut down Ballon d’Or winner Aitana Bonmati, who has created 26 chances in the Champions League this term, five more than any other player.
On the other side, Lionesses duo Lucy Bronze and Kiera Walsh both lifted the trophy with Barcelona last year and their knowledge of their former teammates could help Chelsea edge the tie this time around.
Bronze has only finished on the losing side in one of her last nine semi-final appearances, (W6 D2), losing against Chelsea while with Barcelona in last season’s first leg.
Meanwhile, Mayra Ramirez has been directly involved in five goals in seven starts in the UWCL (four goals, one assist), but all of those goal involvements have come at Stamford Bridge.
Fellow forward Johanna Rytting Kaneryd won possession in the final third five times in Chelsea’s second-leg victory over Man City in the previous round, the joint-most by a player on record in a knockout-stage game in the UWCL (since 2021-22). Overall in 2024-25, only three players have won possession in the final third more often than the Swede (12 times), so the Blues are equipped to apply pressure from the front.
Barcelona vs Chelsea Head-to-Head
Chelsea have won four of their last five meetings with Spanish opposition in the Women’s Champions League (L1) after winning just two of their previous eight (D4 L2).
The Blues have also progressed from seven of their nine Champions League knockout-stage ties when playing the first leg away from home, winning the first leg on six occasions (L3).
Barcelona have lost just one of their five Champions League meetings with Chelsea (W3 D1), though they have actually failed to win their two home games against the Blues in the competition (D1 L1).
The Blaugrana should take confidence, however, from the fact they have progressed from each of their last four knockout ties against English opposition (including the 2021 final), since they were eliminated in the round of 16 by Bristol City in 2014-15.
Barcelona vs Chelsea Prediction
This will be a tough match for Bompastor’s side, but Chelsea will draw hope from last season’s first-leg victory over Barça, even if they couldn’t finish the job to make the final.Barcelona are very strong at home, winning 18 of 19 matches and drawing the other in all competitions this season.
The Opta supercomputer makes the hosts favourites to win the first leg with a 49.5% win probability, with the draw rated at 25.4%.
Chelsea win 25.1% of simulations, so a realistic target may be to stay in the tie before heading back to Stamford Bridge, where they have won all four of their European games this season.
Opta Power Rankings
The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system. They assign an ability score to over 2,000 domestic women’s football teams. This score is on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world.
Ahead of kick-off this weekend, Barcelona and Chelsea are the top two club sides in women’s football according to the Opta Power Rankings.
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