BILBAO, Spain (AP) - Barcelona will need to find a way to get past the most successful club in women's soccer if it wants to build on its recent dominance in the sport.
The Catalan club will be playing in its fourth straight Women's Champions League final on Saturday in Bilbao against record eight-time champion Lyon, the nemesis it has never been able to beat.
The titleholders from Spain have a shot at a statement victory by finally overcoming the storied French club and winning its third European title - all within a four-season span.
Lyon, meanwhile, will be hoping to reclaim the trophy after not getting past the quarterfinals last season and seeing the hype grow about Barcelona and its star players Alexia Putellas and Aitana Bonmati, who have won back-to-back player of the year awards.
"We're coming up against a Barcelona team that is a really tidy European side, and they are the holders, so we know, above all, to respect all of our opponents," said Lyon coach Sonia Bompastor, the first woman to win the title both as a player and coach.
"We know that all our rivals want to bring Olympique Lyonnais down a peg or two, so they're always very motivated," said Bompastor, who also can become the first woman to win two titles as a coach. "Now, we are very focused on ourselves. I've said since the start of the season that we have a lot of quality in the group, and a squad that is very talented and very strong."
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Lyon will be playing in its 11th European final in 15 seasons. It won five titles in a row from 2016-20, and holds nearly every Women's Champions League club record. The French side won all four matches it has played against Barcelona, including 4-1 in the 2019 final in Hungary and 3-1 in the 2022 final in Italy.
Barcelona, in its fourth final in six seasons, beat Chelsea for its first European title in 2021 in Sweden and Wolfsburg for its second in 2023 in the Netherlands.
"We have the confidence of being a more experienced team," said Barcelona coach Jonatan Giraldez, who will leave at the end of the season to join U.S. club Washington Spirit. "We're a team that has been growing a lot, not only in domestic competitions, international competitions, but also with the national team, of course."
The club had nine players in the Spain squad that broke through with the nation's first Women's World Cup title last year, a feat eventually marred by the unwanted kiss by former soccer federation president Luis Rubiales on player Jenni Hermoso during the awards ceremony. Barcelona also sent eight players to the Final Four of the inaugural Women's Nations League, which Spain won in February.
Barcelona is trying to become the third team to win three European titles, after the eight by Lyon and four by Eintracht Frankfurt. It made it to the final by overcoming a 1-0 first-leg loss to Chelsea at home in the semifinals. Lyon eliminated French rival Paris Saint-Germain in the last four.
Lyon has lost two of its goal scorers from the 2022 final in Turin - Amandine Henry and Catarina Macario. The other, Ada Hegerberg, is doubtful to play on Saturday because of an injury.
It will be the third time the Women's Champions League final will take place in Spain after it was held in Getafe in 2010 - the first one-game decider for the rebranded Women's Champions League - and San Sebastian in 2020 in an empty stadium because of the coronavirus pandemic. Saturday's match will take place at Athletic Bilbao's 53,000-capacity San Mames Stadium, which is expected to be filled with a majority of pro-Barcelona supporters.
It was the third straight season in which there was a 16-team home-and-away group stage in the Women's Champions League. In all, 70 clubs from 49 nations participated, with more than 500,000 people attending the games throughout the season.
In the final on Saturday, it will be either Barcelona adding to its dominance or Lyon showing it's still the club to beat in Europe.
"Barca and Lyon are the two best teams in Europe, without any doubt," Giraldez said. "It will be a fun final."
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AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer
TALES AZZONI
Azzoni is a sports reporter based in Madrid in charge of Spain and Portugal for The Associated Press. He has covered multiple World Cups and Olympic Games for the AP, as well as other major sporting events worldwide.
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