Barcelona and Manchester City won lopsidedly as the first round of this season’s UEFA Champions League continued on Wednesday, with nine matches remaining till Matchday 3.
Raphinha scored a hat trick in Barcelona’s 4-1 win, with 17-year-old Lamine Yamal setting up the Brazilian’s third goal with a superb long pass.
Liverpool, Inter Milan, Lille, Dinamo Zagreb, and Feyenoord also won, although Atlético Madrid, Benfica, FC Salzburg, and Young Boys all lost at home.
Here are the important takeaways from Wednesday’s games.
Can Barcelona compete for the title this season?
Three years after Lionel Messi left Barcelona, are the five-time European winners again in contention for the winners League title?
The Blaugrana certainly looked like it on Wednesday, thumping Bayern Munich to wrap up this round’s results in the world’s top club competition.
To be honest, Barcelona was not competitive during Messi’s final years with the club. Who can forget Bayern’s 8-2 thumping of the GOAT and Co. in the 2020 quarterfinals, which marked the end of Barcelona’s most successful era?
Bayern Munich won the Champions League that season. Their coach, Hansi Flick, has been a sensation in his debut season in Catalonia. Barcelona currently leads Spain’s La Liga, with a 9-1 record.
Flick’s group still has plenty to show. Even with an early red card, last month’s 2-1 loss in Monaco raised red flags. The league defeat at Osasuna occurred less than two weeks later. Barcelona, on the other hand, should not be dismissed when at their best. That was apparent from Wednesday’s defeat.
Liverpool maintains its perfect record with a victory in Germany.
Speaking of trophy contenders, the Reds went into Wednesday’s encounter in Leipzig knowing they needed to win to stay unbeaten and match Champions League leader and English opponent Aston Villa’s 3-0 start to the European season.
It wasn’t always pleasant, but Liverpool earned three points. Arne Slot’s team scored in the first half after Darwin Núñez cleared Mohamed Salah’s header in the 27th minute. They then turned off the hosts for the rest of the game.
The Reds’ defensive performance was particularly impressive, as they have now gone 8-0 in all competitions since their shock 1-0 defeat to Nottingham Forest at Anfield on September 14. It is still the only game they have not won this season.
A reminder from Manchester City.
If City’s Champions League home opener against Inter Milan in September — a rematch of the 2023 final that brought club soccer’s most coveted piece of silverware to the blue half of Manchester for the first time — raised concerns about Pep Guardiola’s team’s readiness to compete for glory this season, consider the Citizens’ response over the last two games.
Sure, defeating Sparta Prague 5-0 on Wednesday after a 4-0 thrashing of Slovan Bratislava on October 1 is less impressive than matching wins against higher-level opponents. City’s last five first-round matches, which include trips to Sporting Lisbon, Juventus, and Paris Saint-Germain, will determine where Guardiola’s club stands entering the knockout stage early next year.
Until then, the Sky Blues are the bookies’ favorites. For good reason: they still have Erling Haaland, soccer’s most dangerous striker, who scored twice on Wednesday. His opening strike was simply superhuman.
