It’s the best of Spain against the kings of German football in the final round of Champions League matches.
A rematch of last season’s final between Real Madrid and Borussia Dortmund grabs the headlines on Tuesday, before Barcelona host Bayern Munich on Wednesday in the next chapter of a somewhat one-sided rivalry in Europe’s top club competition.
All four teams have been European champions over the past 30 years, and they have had mixed starts in this season’s revamped format.
Dortmund won their opening two matches – 3-0 at Club Brugge and 7-1 at home to Celtic – to become the early leaders and top scorer in the league phase, which sees all 36 teams play eight matches: four at home and four at home. Four away.
Just like last season when they reached the Champions League final against the odds before losing to Real Madrid, Dortmund have been more impressive in Europe than in the Bundesliga. In fact, after a thumping victory over Celtic, Dortmund lost to Union Berlin four days later.
Meanwhile, Real Madrid are coming off a shock 1-0 loss to Lille, the defending champions’ first defeat in the competition since the semi-finals in the 2022-23 season.
Indeed, the second round of matches saw some shocks, including Bayern’s 1-0 loss to Aston Villa, ending their unbeaten run under new coach Vincent Kompany.
Bayern now head to Barcelona in search of a seventh straight head-to-head win, a run that includes a humiliating 8-2 loss to Barcelona in the quarter-finals in 2020. Hansi Flick was in charge of Bayern that night and is now Barcelona’s coach.
Man City scored
If Manchester City beat Sparta Prague at home on Wednesday, the English champions would set the record for the number of consecutive unbeaten matches in the history of the competition – even stretching back to before 1992 in the European Cup era.
City are currently on a 25-game unbeaten run, tied with Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United side of 2007-09.
The last loss for Pep Guardiola’s side in the Champions League was a 3-1 defeat to Real Madrid in the second leg of the semi-final in 2022, which cost City a place in the final that season.
Since then, City have won 17 games and drawn eight, having won the tournament in 2022-23 and being eliminated on penalties by Real Madrid in 2023-24 after two successive quarter-final draws.
He is unlikely to be a high flyer
Of the seven teams with a maximum of six points, Brest is undoubtedly the most surprising.
This is the unheralded French side’s first time in Europe – in any competition – after an unexpected third-place finish in Ligue 1 last season. Things couldn’t go better.
A 2-1 victory over Austrian champion Sturm Graz was followed by a 4-0 crushing victory over another Austrian team, Salzburg, in the second round of matches.
They will be the easiest opponents Brest will face. Now the hard work begins, as the German champions will face Bayer Leverkusen next Wednesday.
Leverkusen will not be heading to Brest, a beautiful seaside city in Brittany, but to Guingamp – about 114 kilometers (71 miles) away. This is because Brest Stadium does not meet UEFA standards, so its home matches were moved.
Bad beginnings
With each team playing eight matches in the new league system, opening with back-to-back losses is not the nightmare start it would have been in the old system when there were six matches per team in the group stage.
However, Milan, Leipzig, Girona, Salzburg, Sturm Graz, Slovan Bratislava, Young Boys and Red Star Belgrade will be desperate to pick up at least one point in the third round of matches.
Salzburg and Young Boys didn’t even score a goal.
One of the eight teams without points is certain to be dropped out of the race, as newcomers Girona host Slovan Bratislava on Tuesday.
Leipzig could easily have zero points after three games, with Liverpool visiting on Wednesday – the most exciting fixture since former Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp signed as head of global football at Red Bull, whose international network of clubs includes Leipzig.
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Steve Douglas exists https://twitter.com/sdouglas80
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AP Soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer