Champions League: Manchester City is rolling, Real Madrid ekes into the quarters-ZoomTech News

Doug McIntyre

Soccer Journalist

Two extra groups superior on Wednesday to the UEFA Champions League quarterfinals, with trophy holders Manchester Metropolis and 14-time European titlist Actual Madrid becoming a member of Bayern Munich and Paris Saint-Germain within the final eight.

Listed here are three fast ideas on Wednesday’s pair of decisive spherical of 16 video games.

Man Metropolis is discovering its toes on the excellent time

As coldly efficient as Pep Guardiola’s staff has been this season, it is not unfair to level out that Metropolis has largely carried out under its devastating greatest from a yr in the past, when the Sky Blues produced a shocking clear sweep of the European, Premier League and FA Cup titles.

The previous couple of weeks have been completely different. Metropolis completed off Danish facet FC Copenhagen on Wednesday with a 3-1 dwelling win (6-2 on combination over the 2 video games) on targets by Manuel Akanji, Julián Álvarez and (after all) Erling Haaland:

It is the third one-sided lead to a row for Haaland & Co., which got here into Wednesday’s contest on the again of two different laughers: a 3-1 drubbing of crosstown rival Manchester United on Sunday that adopted a 6-2 midweek pasting of Luton City in FA Cup motion.

Merely put, Metropolis is getting sizzling when it issues essentially the most. The scary half is that Guardiola’s staff nonetheless has room for enchancment, because the objective the guests scored on Wednesday confirmed. However whereas they nonetheless have work to do — particularly within the Prem, the place they path Liverpool by a degree with 11 video games to go — it could shock no person in the event that they claimed all three trophies this spring, too.

Unconvincing Actual Madrid stumbles into the quarters

No disrespect to RB Leipzig, however after Actual Madrid beat the Germans 1-0 on their very own turf final month, most observers believed Los Blancos would run away with the second leg at Estadio Santiago Bernabéu.

Somebody forgot to inform the guests. Leipzig gave the continent’s most successful-ever membership matches all evening within the Spanish capital, dropping the sequence however not the match, which completed 1-1.

The Bundesliga facet had the hosts on their heels from the outset on Wednesday, however the menace appeared to be over when Jude Bellingham arrange Vinícius Júnior for the opening objective following a devastating counterattack.

However Willi Orbán canceled out the strike lower than three minutes later, and Actual was most likely fortunate to flee even with an unsatisfying 2-1 combination victory after Dani Olmo’s stoppage time chip beat keeper Andriy Lunin however not the crossbar.

Advancing is what counts, clearly. However Actual’s supporters have come to anticipate greater than being out-shot by an virtually 2-1 margin (18-10) in such a important match. They know in addition to anybody that Carlo Ancelotti’s staff must ship extra, far more, if Actual is so as to add a fifteenth European title this season.

A hat tip for FC Copenhagen

Given the response by the touring followers, no person would’ve guessed that the Danes have been nonetheless trailing 5-2 on combination after Mohamed Elyounoussi pulled one again for the friends on the Emirates Stadium.

For Copenhagen backers, simply attending to this stage of the world’s prime membership competitors represented a triumph. And whereas the common-or-garden membership’s Cinderella run to the knockout stage was lastly was a pumpkin on Wednesday, what a season it was. Copenhagen earned its approach right here with a well-known dwelling win over Manchester United. It held mighty Bayern Munich to a scoreless tie — in Germany.

And whereas the membership was a little bit unfortunate to attract the defending champs and 2024 favorites within the spherical of 16, they exit the competitors with their heads held excessive.

Doug McIntyre is a soccer author for FOX Sports activities. Earlier than becoming a member of FOX Sports activities in 2021, he was a workers author with ESPN and Yahoo Sports activities and he has coated United States males’s and girls’s nationwide groups at a number of FIFA World Cups. Comply with him on Twitter @ByDougMcIntyre.