Manchester United boss Sir Alex Ferguson feels Barcelona's domination will not go on forever.
He also claimed he never considered man-marking Messi, who was voted man of the match after scoring for the first time on English soil as a Barcelona player.
Ferguson said: "We tried to play the way we normally play. It's alien to us to man-mark players, It wasn't good enough on the night. We understand that and we acknowledge it and we can step forward from here.
"Great teams go in cycles and the cycle they (Barcelona) are in at the moment is the best in Europe, there's no question of that. How long it lasts, whether they can replace that team at another point...they certainly have the philosophy. Can you find players like Xavi and Iniesta and Messi all the time? Probably not. But they are enjoying the moment that they have just now."