Chelsea are travelling to Spain on the back of a morale-boosting win against London rivals West Ham on the weekend, thanks to a Kalou strike in the 56^th minute. This victory over the Hammers will do little to keep Chelsea in the title race, as both Liverpool and United won decisively their fixtures against Hull City and Tottenham respectively, but it will nevertheless serve them well for Tuesday.

The Blues will now face the might of Barcelona in an attempt to assure themselves a second back-to-back appearance in the final of the Champions League, after losing to United in Moscow last year. The English and Spanish clubs have clashed on four previous occasion in this tournament, with Chelsea progressing twice, in the 2004-05 and 2006-07 seasons.

The Catalans, however, demolished the Blues 5-1 in extra time in the 1999-2000 quarter-finals after losing the first leg at Stamford Bridge 3-1. Barca's Carles Puyol is the only remaining player from those two encounters, although Barca's current coach Josep Guardiola played in the second leg.

As Barça prepare for the heavy encounter with their familiar and tough opponents from London, Josep Guardiola's Barcelona are facing a similar sort of pressure as Manchester United experienced in 1999.

Barcelona have witnessed on the domestic front an alarming resurgence of Real Madrid. Their comfortable cushion of a 12-point lead over arch rivals Madrid was systematically eroded as the Queen of Europe registered a staggering 17 consecutive league wins out of 18 fixtures which has brought them breathing down the Catalan's necks, just four points adrift.

If that weren't enough, now Barcelona will face an old nemesis in the form of Guus Hiddink who is the main culprit for having resurrected Chelsea and to a large extent – saving their season. Hiddink used to make the life of Barcelona particularly arduous when he was at the helm of Valencia CF, so undoubtedly the two encounters with Chelsea will be of particular significance.

Apart from meeting in the lucrative Champions League, Barca and Chelsea have had to sort it out in other less glamorous encounters, in the semi-finals of the 1965-66 Fairs Cup. Barca proceeded to the final after a 5-0 destruction in the decisive match on home territory. Both clubs had won their regular home ties 2-0.

In total, Barcelona have won five out of 11 outings against the Londoners with the Blues winning four and two being a draw.