UEFA Champions League News
Jhon Durán helps Mourinho’s side to 5-2 aggregate win
Rangers advance to face Club Brugge in playoffs
José Mourinho is one round away from taking Fenerbahce back into the Champions League for the first time in 17 years.
The storied head coach’s team surged into the Champions League qualifying playoffs by overturning a two-goal deficit in a 5-2 qualifying round win against Robin van Persie’s Feyenoord.
Continue reading...Jose Mourinho’s Fenerbahce roared back to set up a playoff with Benfica, while Bromley stunned Ipswich in the Carabao Cup
15 min: Fenerbahce 0-0 Feyenoord (agg: 1-2) Jhon Duran – the very same – has just hit the side netting with Fener’s first half-chance. Feyenoord have probably played the more intricate football but Fenerbahce look a threat on the break.
Champions League qualifying latest (6pm KOs unless stated)
Qarabag 4-1 Shkendija (5pm, agg: 5-1)
FC Copenhagen 0-0 Malmo FF (agg: 0-0)
Fenerbahce 0-0 Feyenoord (agg: 1-2)
Pafos 1-0 Dynamo Kyiv (agg: 2-0)
Plzen 0-0 Rangers (agg: 0-3)
Continue reading...Rangers win 3-0 in first leg of third qualifying round
Team respond to Martin’s anger after Motherwell draw
Russell Martin’s bold team selection paid off as Rangers defeated Viktoria Plzen 3-0 in the first leg of their Champions League third qualifying round tie at Ibrox.
Martin hit out at some of his squad following their deflating 1-1 draw at Motherwell on Saturday, questioning mentality, egos and application and the captain, James Tavernier, and the midfielder Nicolas Raskin were the biggest names among the expected changes.
Continue reading...Rangers draw 1-1 in Athens to win 3-1 on aggregate
Shelbourne into Europa League after Qarabag defeat
Djeidi Gassama turned super-sub once again with a crucial goal as Rangers beat profligate Panathinaikos 3-1 on aggregate in their Champions League second qualifier in Athens.
Leading 2-0 from the first leg at Ibrox, only another fine performance in the Olympic stadium from Rangers’ goalkeeper Jack Butland, who thwarted the Greek side in the first leg, kept the tie goalless at the break. Filip Djuricic opened the scoring with a header in the 53rd minute but moments after coming off the bench, Gassama, who scored from a substitute’s role on his debut last week, levelled at 1-1 with a stunning drive.
Continue reading...London-born winger is rekindling his joy for the game in an unlikely location and is about to live out a lifelong dream with Zrinjski Mostar
At the end of last year Tyler Burey was playing out of position in defence for a team doomed to relegation from the Football League. Seven months later he is preparing to make his Champions League debut after leaving England behind, seeking to rediscover his love for the game in an unlikely location.
Burey moved to Igman Konjic, a club in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in January on a short-term deal and impressed to such an extent that the country’s title winners, Zrinjski Mostar, signed him on a two-year contract. On Tuesday they visit Virtus of San Marino in the opening leg of their Champions League first qualifying round tie, allowing Burey to live out a lifelong dream.
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Football Daily would prefer not to have to think about Copa Gianni at all but we have a certain professional obligation to do so and have never knowingly been found shirking in the face of our responsibilities. To keep things simple, we prefer to view the tournament as a stand-alone competition that’s taking place between the end of the last season and the beginning of the next one, but the fact that it’s being contested by clubs instead of countries leaves plenty of room for debate. Watching Kingsley Coman “sprint” on to a through-ball from Harry Kane during Bayern Munich’s defeat by PSG as if he was running in knee-deep wet cement, we were presented with the sight of a player in next season’s kit who was quite clearly exhausted by the exertions of the one that may or may not have ended before the tournament in which he was playing started. Does the goal he didn’t score go down in the official xG column of last season, next season, or neither?
There’s me being able to walk down the stairs after I’ve played 90 minutes of football, there’s me in the future when I have children being able to walk around properly, being able to bend down and pick up toys, there’s me being able to do normal life things like put on socks without being in pain and, for the first time in a long time, I genuinely didn’t think about the response of the public because that just wasn’t a priority” – Millie Bright reveals how she is feeling better in her mind after taking the decision to miss Euro 2025 and prioritise her recovery from a knee injury.
Sometimes Mauricio Pochettino wants it to be a penalty, sometimes he doesn’t. There’s just no pleasing some people. Extra moaning points for Poch insinuating that the officials were swayed by the pro-Mexico crowd for a game that USA USA USA were playing at home. P.S. A doff of the cap to Mexico for that uber cool black and gold kit …” – Noble Francis.
With a tip of the cap to The Usual Suspects … the greatest trick Infantino ever pulled was turning me into a Chelsea fan for two hours rooting against Infantino’s home team making the finals” – Harry Webb.
I can’t have been your only reader who paused between Friday’s tea time email and big website’s MBM coverage of the Jurassic reunion opening gig, to turn the dial of my retro digital transistors to the political satirical radio broadcast, Deadringers. I – and what I suspect to be 1,056 others – nearly choked on my fermented tofu when I heard a repeat of your dinosaur banter about the aforementioned group of monobrows. I assume the requisite phone calls were made – i.e. your people calling their people, etc – and payment made (four pack of budget Tin) before Tom Baker’s closing remarks” – Nicholas Tipple.
This is an extract from our daily football email … Football Daily. To get the full version, just visit this page and follow the instructions.
Continue reading...With the top-level juggernaut careering away the majority of Europe’s clubs need help and should be better rewarded for players they develop
While a dozen of Europe’s elite clubs were chasing the American dream, 170 of their less garlanded peers gathered for a barbecue next to Lake Geneva. They had converged on Uefa’s headquarters to attend the qualifying round draws for next season’s continental competitions; Tuesday night was time to get together, perhaps to speed-date representatives of the team you had been paired with or simply to cut loose before a labyrinthine summer spent journeying in search of league-phase football.
Borussia Dortmund were slugging out a goalless draw with Fluminense while the meat hit the grills, but “Club World Cup” is a dirty formulation in Nyon’s corridors of power. Any available screens showed action from Uefa’s own Under-21 Championship and alternative sources of entertainment roamed the pastel green lawns. A caricature artist did the rounds, stopping at the table occupied by Aleksander Ceferin and putting his pencil to work.
Continue reading...After years as a directionless collection of celebrity footballers, PSG are a true team now. But they still represent one of the sport’s darkest trends
Paris Saint-Germain’s success in the Champions League final on Saturday was a victory for youth and adventure. It was a victory for a team built with a coherent vision, and a rebuke to those who believe the game is just about collecting the biggest names. It was a victory for Luis Enrique, a very fine coach who has suffered dreadful personal tragedy. It was a victory for forward-thinking, progressive, fluent football.
But it was also a victory for sportswashing.
Continue reading...PSG left little doubt as to who the best team in this season’s Champions League was, but there was individual brilliance on plenty of other squads
Gianluigi Donnarumma (Paris Saint-Germain)
Continue reading...Writers bemoaned Inter’s ‘climax of suffering’ in Munich but saved their harshest words for Simone Inzaghi
On the front pages of Italy’s newspapers, the Champions League final was told as a “nightmare”, a “humiliation”, and a “rout”. Tuttosport at least found room for humour with a “DisIntergrated” pun. La Stampa, in deference to the victors Paris Saint-Germain, went instead with a French phrase: “La débâcle”.
Any team can lose a Champions League final but Internazionale were the first to do so by a five-goal margin. The final indignity of a season in which they aspired to repeat the treble they won under José Mourinho, only to come unstuck at the last: losing the Coppa Italia semi-final to neighbours Milan and then missing out on the Serie A title by one point.
Continue reading...The best pictures from Munich where PSG thrashed Inter 5-0 in the most one-sided Champions League final in history
Continue reading...PSG finally became champions of Europe after routing Inter as they recorded the biggest margin of victory in any European Cup or Champions League final
Pennant watch. Here’s what PSG captain Marquinhos will be handing over during the pre-match niceties. A typically classy piece in the retro-poster style, here it’s the centrepiece of an enigmatic pop-art collage also featuring a fruit platter, several hundred toothpicks, some power bars, three toilet rolls, a carry case of assorted hardware, and what may or may not be a box of Terry’s Chocolate Orange in the top-right corner. If this was an LP cover you’d stay up half the night trying to decode it.
Inter are playing in their third-choice yellow strip this evening. So that means their pennant will clash with captain Lautaro Martínez’s shirt, but what a gorgeous thing it is anyway (the current Volkswagen-adjacent monstrosity of a crest, not half as good as the old interlapping FCIM logo, notwithstanding).
Continue reading...All the buildup to the Munich final
Jonathan Liew: PSG v Inter is clash of styles on and off pitch
You can email Barry | Kick-off is at 8pm BST
Comment: “The Champions League final is a jarring and stirring clash of styles in so many ways,” writes Jonathan Liew. “The relentless attack of Paris Saint-Germain and the relentless defence of Inter. One team built on the freehand wizardry of youth and one built on the weathered edifice of experience. Flying wingers against flying wing-backs, two strikers against none. But perhaps the biggest philosophical difference is between two radically different models of a football club itself: who it serves, what it can be, what constitutes success, and how to get there.”
Guardian Football Weekly podcast: Max Rushden was in the chair as the Football Weekly panel previewed tonight’s Champions League final. You can listen to our discussion here and if you’re not already a regular listener, what have you been doing for the past 19 years!?!? You can sign up for Football Weekly on all the usual podcast platforms.
Continue reading...Champions League final features opposing tactical approaches and two radically different ownership models
In 2021, Oaktree Capital quietly rebranded its “Distressed Debt” division as the “Opportunistic Credit” platform. For decades the LA-based investment fund had specialised in picking up what is known in the trade as distressed assets, a strategy it described as looking for “good companies with bad balance sheets”.
So let’s say your company is screwed. You’re deep in debt, severely short of cash, perhaps even at risk of bankruptcy or default. In sweep Oaktree. They have a mosey around, shake down some creditors, restructure your cost base, perhaps offer you a high‑interest loan to stop the bleeding. Once they’ve got you battle-lean they find you a buyer, you sell up, and they take a fat cut. Four years ago, as they cast an eye over the Covid-emaciated carcass of Inter, this was exactly the strategy they had in mind.
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With the 2024-25 season in Uefa-land drawing to its glamorous close, is there a better time to assess how the whole thing went down with everything considered in the round? Yes! But Football Daily doesn’t publish on Sunday morning, so let’s make the best of a bad lot. And it’s been a good year for English football all right. Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester United went to the artistic and creative mecca of Bilbao and staged what can only be described as a dirty protest, a Chelsea squad worth £1,400,000,000 struggled against (though eventually steamrollered) a team collectively priced at 0.96% of a Mykhailo Mudryk, and it’s fair to say the rest of the continent will be extremely glad to see the back of us.
This is an extract from our daily football email … Football Daily. To get the full version, just visit this page and follow the instructions.
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