- PSG produce stunning comeback to leave Man City on the verge of Champions League elimination
- Barcelona qualified for the last 16 after an insane 5-4 victory over Benfica
- Liverpool top league phase after victory over Lille
The Champions League threw up some monumental scorelines in gameday seven, with one of them leaving a recent winner of European football’s grandest prize on the verge of elimination at the first phase.
Manchester City’s patchy Premier League form over the past few months has carried over onto the continent, with the rot beginning in November when Pep Guardiola’s 2023 champions crashed to a humbling 4-1 defeat to Ruben Amorim’s Sporting CP, in Lisbon. Since that night in the Portuguese capital, City have thrown away a 3-0 lead to draw at home to Feyenoord, lost 2-0 in Turin after a dreadful second half against Juventus and, tonight, suffered a catastrophic collapse in Paris after seeing PSG come from 2-0 down to triumph 4-2.
The humbling in the French capital sees City slip into the elimination zone of the newly revamped Champions League group phase, in lowly 25th position in the league table.
In the bottom 12 alongside City sit Dinamo Zagreb and Shakhtar Donetsk on eight and seven points, respectively. Both need victories in their final games to be in with any hope of advancing to the playoff round. City, meanwhile, have a must-win game at home to Club Brugge next week to navigate before they can even begin to think about the playoffs and the round of 16. Anything other than all three points being secured against the Belgian outfit and Pep Guardiola’s men are out of European competition altogether.
All To Play For In The Final League Phase Matchday
Within three points of the Premier League champions, in the playoff spots, lie VfB Stuttgart, PSG, Sporting CP, Benfica, the aforementioned Club Brugge and PSV Eindhoven. Above this group and with qualification to the playoff round now secure with a week to spare are; Juventus, Real Madrid, Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund, Monaco, Aston Villa, Feyenoord, Brest, Celtic and Lille.
Celtic secured qualification to the playoffs with a narrow 1-0 home defeat of Young Boys, while Real demolished RB Salzburg 5-1 at the Bernabeu. Feyenoord continued their impressive continental form with an emphatic 3-0 hammering of Vincent Kompany’s Bayern Munich. Monaco edged out Villa 1-0 in Monte Carlo to keep their top eight hopes alive, with automatic spots for the round of 16 now being contested more fiercely than ever as we head into the final match day of the league phase.
From Villa in ninth place (13 points) all the way down to Celtic in 18th (12 points) anyone could secure a round of 16 berth in the final round of league phase fixtures. Finishing inside the top eight is hugely advantageous for teams looking to avoid even more fixture pile up and any potentially tricky playoff ties.
Who Is Heading To The Champions League Round Of 16?
Liverpool, with seven wins out of seven, have qualified for the second round with a perfect record, followed by a Barcelona team who, somehow, came away from Lisbon with all three points, after trailing 3-1 and then 4-2 to defeat Benfica 5-4 with a last minute winner from Raphina after the home team were convinced they should have been awarded a penalty. The nine goal thriller was one for the ages and solidified Hansi Flick’s Barca team as the most chaotic squad in the competition.
Arsenal’s comfortable 3-0 home victory over Dinamo Zagreb all but confirmed the Gunners place in the Champions League round of 16, while Atletico Madrid and AC Milan’s closely fought victories over Bayer Leverkusen and Girona have almost done enough to see them avoiding the playoffs. Atalanta’s 5-0 thumping of Sturm Graz was just what the Bergamo outfit needed ahead of the final day visit of Barcelona next week. Leverkusen, fresh off their 2-1 defeat to Atleti, are right on the precipice of dropping into the playoff zone, so we should expect to see Xabi Alonso’s Bundesliga champions throwing absolutely everything at Sparta Prague, next week.
