The Champions League knockout stages continue as holders Chelsea host Lille and Manchester United travel to Atletico Madrid.
Chelsea and United will be hoping to follow Premier League sides Manchester City and Liverpool in securing first-leg leads in the last 16, after Pep Guardiola’s men thrashed Sporting Lisbon 5-0 and Jurgen Klopp’s side beat Inter Milan 2-0.
It’s the only match-up that stayed the same after the Champions League draw had to be redone following a glitch. Chelsea will be even more delighted now.
The European champions can still host a side that has endured an alarming collapse, with Lille going from French champions least season to mid-table now, 23 points behind Paris Saint-Germain at the top. Chelsea, by contrast, has recovered from a wobble to win back-to-back Premier League games to make its hold on third place more secure.
Thomas Tuchel just needs to get record-signing Romelu Lukaku to be more prolific. Aside from two goals in this month’s run to the Club World Cup title, the striker hasn’t scored a goal against top-tier opposition since December in England.
He only managed seven touches of the ball in Saturday’s 1-0 win at Crystal Palace – the fewest by any Premier League player in 90 minutes since Opta started logging the data over the last two decades. Tuchel blamed the lack of overall fluency on his players looking a bit drained, a bit exhausted after the Abu Dhabi trip.
Lille are also encountering frustration in attack with striker Jonathan David’s goals drying up. The Canada forward had a bright first half of the season with three Champions League goals in the group stage and 12 goals in the French league this season. But he is experiencing a drought and has not scored in his last six league games.
Lille coach Jocelyn Gourvennec does at least seem to have stabilised the defence and heads to London on the back of two clean sheets.
- Chelsea and Lille have met in just one European campaign previously – the 2019-20 UEFA Champions League – when the English side won both group stage matches by the same 2-1 scoreline.
- The Blues have only lost one of their previous 10 home European matches against sides from France (W6 D3), a 1-2 defeat to PSG in March 2016 which knocked the Blues out of the UEFA Champions League.
- Lille are appearing in only their second Last 16 tie within the UEFA Champions League, and first since a two-legged defeat to Manchester United back in 2006-07, when they lost 1-0 both home and away.
Elsewhere on Tuesday…
Villarreal vs Juventus: The Turin club hopes to return to the quarter-finals after being eliminated by Porto and Lyon at this stage in the last two seasons on an away-goals rule that has now been scrapped.
They had advanced past the round of 16 three straight times before that. Massimiliano Allegri’s team is coming off two straight draws in the Italian league and has only one win in their last four games in the competition.
Villarreal, playing in the last 16 for the first time in 13 years, enter the match with forward Arnaut Danjuma in top form after he was sidelined for nearly two months because of an injury.
Making only his third appearance with the Spanish club since returning, the Dutchman scored a hat-trick in Villarreal’s 4-1 win at Granada in La Liga on Saturday.
That extended the team’s unbeaten streak to four matches in all competitions and left Unai Emery’s reigning Europa League winners near the Champions League qualification places.
Simeone feeling the heat at Atletico
If Ralf Rangnick is to win a trophy during his interim reign as Manchester United manager, it can only be by delivering the club’s fourth European Cup. The German’s team has already exited the FA Cup, but he has overseen a recovery in the Premier League since Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s firing, taking 25 points from 12 games to take United from sixth to fourth.
A sign of the 63-year-old Rangnick’s top-level coaching inexperience is that the game at Atletico is the first time he’s managed a team in the Champions League knockout phase since his Schalke side was beaten in the semi-finals in 2011 by Alex Ferguson’s United.
Rangnick has been beset by reports about the challenges coaching United and it was significant that he referenced the unity on display in Sunday’s 4-2 win at Leeds in the Premier League. He said the result was the best reply that they could give to some articles last week that there was some disruption in the dressing room.
Atletico are led by the longest-serving coach remaining in this season’s Champions League. But fresh from marking a decade in charge in December, Atletico are enduring one of their most turbulent moments under Diego Simeone. The team is inconsistent – much like United – and Simeone is feeling the heat.
There was an encouraging 3-0 win at Osasuna at the weekend but Atletico had lost four of their previous six games in all competitions before Saturday, including eliminations from the Spanish Super Cup and the Copa del Rey.
Like United in England, Atletico are currently chasing the fourth and final Champions League qualification place in Spain. Simeone is likely to face United without Daniel Wass and Matheus Cunha because of injuries, while Thomas Lemar remains in isolation with coronavirus. While Atletico are the defending Spanish champions, United haven’t won a trophy since the 2017 Europa League under Jose Mourinho.
- Atletico Madrid and Manchester United have only appeared in the same European campaign once before – the 1991-92 Cup Winners’ Cup – when the Spanish side knocked out their English counterparts 4-1 on aggregate in the Last 16.
- United’s only previous visit to Atlético Madrid was in the first leg of their 1991-92 Cup Winners’ Cup tie at the Vicente Calderón, when a starting XI that contained Peter Schmeichel, Denis Irwin, Steve Bruce, Paul Ince, Bryan Robson and Mark Hughes (amongst others) were beaten 3-0 by Luis Aragonés’ men.
- Atletico have lost each of their last four Champions League matches against English teams, double the number of defeats they suffered across their first 12 such matches in the competition.
Elsewhere on Wednesday…
Benfica vs Ajax: The Amsterdam club sparkled in the group stage, winning all six games as Sebastien Haller became the first man to score 10 goals in his first six games in the competition.
The Dutch leaders are as dominant domestically, winning the last seven matches to establish a five-point lead at the top of the Eredivisie.
Benfica reached the last 16 by helping to eliminate Barcelona with a win and draw against the five-time European champions. But Benfica’s confidence isn’t so high now after winning only twice in five games in all competitions.
The latest setback was a 2-2 draw at relegation-threatened Boavista in the Portuguese league after leading 2-0 until the 74th minute.
The result was another blow for the Portuguese powerhouse that are only third in the league standings, behind rivals Sporting Lisbon and leaders Porto. It’s a slump overseen by Nelson Verissimo, the B team coach who took over after Jorge Jesus was fired at the end of last year despite the results against Barcelona.
What happened last week?
In the round’s other matches, Kylian Mbappe – who has long been linked with a move to Real Madrid – scored a 94th-minute winner against Carlo Ancelotti’s side as Paris Saint-Germain take a slender advantage into the second leg.
Red Bull Salzburg, the first Austrian side in Champions League history to reach the knockout rounds, drew 1-1 with Bayern Munich.
Do City need to win it this year?
“100 per cent they do. It’s alright winning the Premier League as they’ve got £80m players in every position and while Pep’s not won the Champions League in 10 years, City never have.
“The longer it goes on, the harder it becomes if I’m being honest. Teams are becoming stronger. They’re not becoming weaker. When Man City are buying players, they’re not even making a massive difference.
“They signed Jack Grealish, but he’s not done anything yet and they’re still going to win the league. I think Jack will be alright but the longer City go without winning the Champions League, the harder it will be.
“City have got to win it. Sometimes, their problem is that the Premier League is too easy for them. It’s alright whipping up Norwich every week, and that’s their bread and butter. But it’s a major problem.
“We see it over the years with Manchester United back in the day. The league was too easy for them, and then they would play gung-ho football against Real Madrid and get punished.
“Sometimes, City have to be a little bit more tactically aware. Teams like Bayern Munich have got players who can really hurt you.”
The state of play
As the 2021/22 Champions League returns for the round of 16, we bring you the state of play, upcoming fixtures and the schedule for the remainder of the tournament.
The group stage of the competition came to a conclusion in early December, with Borussia Dortmund and Barcelona the big-hitters who exited prior to the round of 16, dropping into the Europa League as a result.
For Dortmund, it represented just the second time in a decade they had failed to progress from the group stage, with five-time winners Barca a mainstay of the latter stages in 19 of the last 20 campaigns.
From a British perspective, Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City sealed their spot in the last 16 with a game to spare, meaning their 2-1 defeat to RB Leipzig in their final group game mattered little, although Champions League holders Chelsea had to settle for second spot in Group H after drawing 3-3 with Zenit in their last group fixture.
Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool side – who had already grabbed top spot in Group B with two games to spare – became the first English side to win all six Champions League group-stage games, beating AC Milan 2-1 in their final match to give a reminder of their own threat in this competition.
Meanwhile, Manchester United pipped last season’s Europa League winners Villarreal to Group F top spot, despite drawing two of their last three games, and will face now face Atletico Madrid.
Round of 16
First-leg fixtures
Tuesday February 15
Wednesday February 16
Tuesday February 22
Wednesday February 23
Second-leg fixtures
Tuesday March 8
Wednesday March 9
Tuesday March 15
Wednesday March 16
Quarter-finals
Draw scheduled to take place on Friday March 18.
First legs scheduled to be played on Tuesday April 5 and Wednesday April 6; Second legs on Tuesday April 12 and Wednesday April 13.
Semi-finals
Draw scheduled to take place on Friday March 18.
First legs scheduled to be played on Tuesday April 26 and Wednesday April 27; Second legs on Tuesday May 3 and Wednesday May 4.
Final
Scheduled to be played on Saturday May 28 at Krestovsky Stadium, Saint Petersburg.
Champions League state of play: Chelsea host Lille | Man Utd at Atletico
Source: Pinoy Portal Articles