Champions League: Real Madrid’s late magic downs Manchester City again

Doug McIntyre

Soccer Journalist

It’s becoming a regular theme in recent years in the business end of the UEFA Champions League: Real Madrid coming back from what appeared to be certain defeat to stun mighty Manchester City.

On Tuesday in England, the defending European champs and record 15-time winners of soccer’s most prestigious club competition once again roared back from a second-half deficit to win, taking a 3-2 aggregate lead in their two-leg, home-and-home, total-goals-wins series with a place in the round of 16 at stake.

Real-City was the undisputed headliner of this new playoff round, but there were three other matches around the continent on Tuesday. These are the big takeaways.

Another instant classic between Real Madrid and Man City

For all the talk about Real Madrid’s magic in this tournament, the cold reality is that Los Blancos probably boasts the best collection of players on the planet. That still doesn’t explain how Real Madrid consistently manages to come back from the dead in Champions League play against Pep Guardiola’s side, perhaps the only club in the world whose squad can match theirs man-for-man.

Last year, they came back twice in the quarterfinal first leg to end the Sky Blues’ hopes of repeating. Two years earlier, Madrid scored three times in stoppage time to reach the final, which they went on to win over Liverpool.

City, of course, won its first Champions League crown in between, beating Real on the way to the 2023 title. But Tuesday was more of the same.

Twice Erling Haaland gave City the lead — the Norwegian striker’s first two career goals against Real in five games — and seemed to have won it from the penalty spot in the 80th minute. But twice the visitors came roaring back to level the score, first via Kylian Mbappé and then through second-half substitute (and noted Cityzens-killer) Brahim Díaz.

A 2-2 finish would’ve felt like a loss for Guardiola & Co., but not a disaster. Sure enough, though, Jude Bellingham found the winner when he scored in the second minute of stoppage time:

Don’t get it twisted: This is a spirit-crushing loss for the Premier League champs, who have been a shadow of themselves all season. Beating the trophy holders would have been a colossal boost heading into the second leg in Spain’s capital. Now they know they must win at Estadio Santiago Bernabéu or miss out on the last 16 for the first time since 2013.

Up to six American players could’ve been involved in Tuesday’s match in Turin between Juve and the Dutch champs. Unfortunately, three of PSV’s four USMNT reps — Sergiño Dest, Ricardo Pepi and Malik Tillman — are all out with long-term injuries.

All the others started, though: Richy Ledezma for the visitors, and Weston McKennie and Tim Weah for the Italians. And it was McKennie who put the home side ahead with a blistering first-half strike:

The lead held for a while, until Ivan Perišić pulled one back for Peter Bosz’s team. But Juventus will head to the Netherlands with a slim 2-1 advantage thanks to Samuel Mbangula’s winner with less than 10 minutes of regular time remaining.

The only other American involved in Tuesday’s games was little-used Borussia Dortmund attacker Gio Reyna, who didn’t get off the bench in the Black & Yellow’s 3-0 rout of Sporting Lisbon in Portugal.

One of the most compelling storylines of the 2024-25 Champions League season has been Brest, the humble French outfit that has enjoyed a Cinderella run in this year’s competition, finishing higher in the final league phase standings than former European titlists such as Juventus and Manchester City.

The fairy tale met reality on Tuesday. Sure, the back half of the home-and-home with PSG is still to play. But the series is effectively over following the Parisians’ emphatic 3-0 away victory in the first leg — a match the visitors dominated from start to finish.

PSG took the lead on a successful Vitinha penalty kick in the 21st minute and got another before halftime from red-hot Ousmane Dembélé, who made it 3-0 after the break — an all but insurmountable advantage heading into the decisive contest next week in the City of Lights.

Dembélé now has five goals in his last two games against Brest; he scored a hat trick against them earlier this month in Ligue 1.

Doug McIntyre is a soccer writer for FOX Sports who has covered the United States men’s and women’s national teams at FIFA World Cups on five continents. Follow him at @ByDougMcIntyre.