UEFA Champions League
PERHAPS, IT’LL BE SOLSKJAER BIGGEST CHALLENGE SO FAR
FACTS AHEAD OF PSG Vs. MANCHESTER UNITED CLASH
- No club has ever progressed to the next round of the Champions League after losing the first leg of a knockout match at home by two or more goals (34 previous cases).
- Paris St-Germain have lost just one of their last 16 Champions League games at home (W10 D5), but that defeat came in the last 16 last season against Real Madrid (1-2).
- None of the last six English sides to face Paris St-Germain at the Parc des Princes have won. In fact, the only English team to prevail away from home versus PSG were Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea in September 2004 (3-0).
- Four of the last five two-legged encounters between teams from England and France in the Champions League knockout phase have seen the French side progress.
- PSG have scored 35 goals in their last 10 Champions League home games but haven’t kept a clean sheet in each of the last five.
- Manchester United have won only one of their last 10 Champions League knockout games (D3 L6), with this coming against Olympiakos in March 2014 (3-0 at Old Trafford). Their last away win in the knockout stages came eight years ago against Schalke (2-0), in April 2011.
- Manchester United have lost their last two Champions League matches (1-2 away in Valencia in the final group stage match, 0-2 defeat to PSG in the first leg of this tie). They haven’t lost three games in succession in the competition since March 2005.
- The heaviest margin of defeat that Manchester United have suffered over a two-legged European tie is by three goals; in the 1957/58 European Cup semi-final versus AC Milan (2-5 on aggregate) and in the 1991/92 Cup Winners’ Cup Round of 16 against Atletico Madrid (1-4 on aggregate).
According to Manchester United’s interim manager, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, the club’s last-16 second-leg Champions League tie at Paris St-Germain this Wednesday is not “mission impossible.”
The crash of cup holders, Real Madrid and Ajax’s spectacular comeback against cup holders, on Tuesday night at Santiago Bernabue has proven the point that impossibility is nothing.
Just like Ajax who lost at home and went in a big way to defeat a big team, Manchester United will need to activate such magical moments too.
The English Premiership side lost 2-0 at homeand will need to make history to progress and club has ever advanced in the knockout phase after losing at home by two or more goals in the first leg.
“Goals always change games. We’ve got to get the first goal and then anything can happen,” Solskjaer said.
“Football is a technical and tactical game but it’s also a mental game. If we get the first one we would start believing more and then they might start doubting themselves.
“It’s never mission impossible. It’s just more difficult.
“Everyone knows we can do it. In the Champions League in the last few years there have been so many examples of teams that can change results like this.”
United have won 13 out their 16 fixtures in all competitions since Solskjaer took charge in December.
However, despite domestic victories away at Tottenham, Arsenal and Chelsea, United’s last away win in the knock-out phase of the Champions League was in April 2011 against Schalke.
“When nobody believes in you there is always that bit of character in yourself that you want to show,” Solskjaer added.
“Making history is not the motivation. The motivation is going through. These players aren’t used to losing.”
Solskjaer’s side also go into the second leg in Paris with the suspended Paul Pogba and Alexis Sanchez among 10 first-team absentees.
Sanchez will be missing for four to six weeks after going off injured in the 3-2 win over Southampton on Saturday.
Defender Phil Jones is out with illness, while Anthony Martial, Jesse Lingard, Juan Mata, Ander Herrera, Nemanja Matic and Matteo Darmian are all injured and not among the 20-man squad that travelled to France.
Teenagers Tahith Chong, James Garner, Angel Gomes, Mason Greenwood and Brandon Williams have been included.
Meanwhile, Edinson Cavani faces a late fitness test ahead match for Paris St Germain’ according to coach Thomas Tuchel.
The Uruguay striker, who picked up a thigh injury last month and missed his club’s 2-0 win in the first leg at Old Trafford, has taken part in the last two training sessions.
“He took part in the last two training sessions in full, but we are going to wait until tomorrow,” Tuchel told a news conference yesterday.
“We have decided to wait and make a decision on his participation in the game tomorrow.”
UEFA Champions League
Osimhen and Aubameyang: Africa’s First Men of the Match in 2025/26 Champions League
The Champions League has barely started and already African fans have something to be proud of.
Two of the continent’s biggest names, Victor Osimhen from Nigeria and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang from Gabon, have become the first African players this season to be named Man of the Match.
For Osimhen, it was a night to remember in Istanbul. Galatasaray were up against Liverpool, a team with a European pedigree and needed someone to step up. Osimhen did just that.
His goal gave Galatasaray a 1-0 win but it was more than just the goal. His energy and how he kept Liverpool’s defenders on their toes all night made him the best player on the pitch.
So his winning of the UEFA Man of the Match award. Galatasaray fans had proof they have a striker who can change games at the highest level.
Meanwhile, on the same night in Marseille, Aubameyang was showing why he has been Africa’s most reliable goal scorer for over a decade.
At 36, some wondered if he still had it on nights like this. His answer was a thunderous “YES.”
Marseille tore Ajax apart in a 4–0 demolition that saw Aubameyang seal his stature as the orchestrator and heartbeat of the French club’s attack.
His movement, his composure and his leadership stood out. So much so that he too was rightfully awarded the Man of the Match.
The fact that these two happened on the same night made it even more special for African football fans.
Osimhen represents the new generation: quick, hungry and with still a few years ahead to make history.
Aubameyang is the veteran still out there to prove – even though he really has nothing to prove anymore – that experience and class don’t fade easily.
Together, they gave African football fans a double reason to smile.
For Nigeria and Gabon, these awards are more than individual trophies. They are ultimately a reminder of how much African players contribute to the Champions League season in, season out.
And the tournament is still in its early stages. So there’s every chance more players from the continent will follow in their footsteps before the Budapest finale in 2026. Only good omens for the 2025 AFCON that starts in a few months.
-Morocco World News
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In his glory days, Jose Mourinho celebrated dramatic goals from his teams by sprinting down the touchline, sometimes sliding on his knees for extra euphoric effect.
On Tuesday, back at his former club Chelsea as the new coach of Benfica, Mourinho’s most eye-catching intervention was down the touchline again, but this time his run was to urge his team’s fans to stop hurling objects onto the pitch.
Benfica under Mourinho, in his fourth game in charge, were defeated 1-0 by an under-strength Chelsea side in the Champions League after a fist-half Richard Rios own goal.
The self-declared “Special One” was lauded by the home fans with a few choruses of “Jose Mou-rin-ho” in recognition of his successes – three Premier League titles and four other trophies – which no other Chelsea manager has come close to matching.
Mourinho, 62, acknowledged the chants with a gentle wave, got a cheer when he ventured onto the pitch to clear a spare ball and quickly vanished down the tunnel at the final whistle after shaking the hand of Chelsea coach Enzo Maresca.
It was all a far cry from the fervour of 20 years ago when Mourinho – having led Porto to an unlikely Champions League triumph – turned Chelsea into English champions for the first time in 50 years in 2005 and won the title again a year later.
After a collapse of form, Mourinho departed in 2007 but he won the Champions League again, this time with Inter Milan in 2010, knocking out the Londoners on the way to the final.
He went on to manage Real Madrid before returning to Chelsea where he claimed a third English title and then had spells at Manchester United, London side Tottenham Hotspur – an unforgivable move for many Chelsea fans at the time – and Roma.
As the big offers dried up, Mourinho went on to coach Fenerbahce in Turkey where he lasted little more than a year before his return to Portuguese football with Benfica.
Asked after Tuesday’s defeat by Chelsea if he still had the drive of the early days of his career, Mourinho insisted he felt more motivated.
“If I am in a job it’s because I like to put myself on the line every day,” he told reporters. “I am desperate to win the next match.”
Mourinho said he thought Benfica had deserved more from the game. “We started well, we controlled well. I don’t know if I can say big chances but we had chances for sure.”
Chelsea’s Maresca said he was relieved to secure a win – albeit a scrappy one – after two consecutive defeats in the Premier League and a 3-1 loss at Bayern Munich in the his side’s Champions League opener.
“Sometimes you need to learn to win in another way,” he said of Chelsea’s improved defensive performance. “At least we learned how to win a game with a red card.”
Striker Joao Pedro was dismissed for a second yellow card after coming on as a substitute, the third time in four matches that Chelsea have finished with 10 men
-Reuters
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Hosts Eintracht Frankfurt scored four times in 29 minutes to bounce back from a goal down and hammer Galatasaray 5-1 in their Champions League opener on Thursday.
The Turkish sides are without their talismanic striker, Victor Osimhen who was injured while on international duty with Nigeria.
The Turks had hit Frankfurt on the break with Yunus Akgun completing the move from a Leroy Sane assist in the eighth minute. Germany international Sane, who joined from Bayern Munich this season, became the only player in Champions League history to play for four or more clubs and score or assist on his debut for each of them.
Frankfurt, competing for only the second time in the Champions League main round, struggled to break through Galatasaray’s defence until a defensive error from Akgun in the 37th. Ritsu Doan pounced, charged into the box and Davinson Sanchez deflected the Japanese winger’s shot in for an own goal.
The hosts took the lead in first-half stoppage time when 19-year-old Turkey international Can Uzun scored a superb goal on his Champions League debut after fine control and a quick turn in the box. The hosts netted again before halftime with Jonathan Burkardt’s well-timed glancing header putting them 3-1 up.
With the visitors forced to take more risks after the break, Frankfurt found space and Burkardt completed his dream Champions League debut with another header in the 66th for his second goal of the evening. Ansgar Knauff completed the rout in the 75th.
Frankfurt next travel to Atletico Madrid on September 30 when Galatasaray host Liverpool.
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