Category: UEFA Champions League

With one trophy and hundreds of millions up for grabs, league position means more than pride as TV payouts shape the financial future of every club

Points mean prizes. And money. Lots and lots of money. Only one trophy is handed out at the conclusion of the Premier League season, meaning the most tangible reward most teams are playing for over the final few weeks of the campaign is a bigger check.

Last season, each Premier League team received anywhere between £175.9m and £109.7m for their participation in the self-styled Greatest League in the World. These payouts take into account everything from league position, the number of matches broadcast on TV and commercial revenue among other factors.

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Teenager looked at home in Bernabéu contest as Mikel Arteta’s side celebrated progress six years in the making

Where is la remontada? Seriously. There really was supposed to be a remontada around here somewhere. Of all the sprinkles of sugar, the crispy, salty, crunchy morsels for Arsenal’s supporters to pick over after Wednesday night’s brilliantly assured victory at the Bernabéu it is probably Myles Lewis-Skelly’s part that will give the most lasting satisfaction.

Sadly for the banter-angle it seems the immediate post-match rumour that Lewis-Skelly had approached Jude Bellingham and asked him: ‘Where is la remontada?’, as recycled across social media in a dizzying range of languages, turns out to have been, of all things, made up.

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Arteta’s side delivered a performance for the ages to knock out Real Madrid, while PSG held firm at Villa Park and Inter outlasted Bayern to set up a semi-final of contrasts

Arsenal

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• Defender reacted after ballboy threw ball away from him
• Bayern were chasing goal to force extra time at San Siro

Bayern Munich’s Josip Stanisic said it was “stupid” of him to push a ballboy off his stool after he tossed the ball away in stoppage time of their Champions League match against Inter on Wednesday.

A 2-2 draw in the second leg at San Siro enabled Inter to advance to the semi-finals 4-3 on aggregate.

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Bukayo Saka and Gabriel Martinelli scored as Arsenal laughed in the face of the remontada

“Is there really any point watching this game?” asks Matt Dony. “I mean, is there really any point even playing it in the first place? It’s Madrid in Europe. We all know what’s going to happen. They’ll have a blindingly good 10-minute spell towards the end of the first half, where they score two goals. There’ll be a scruffy third goal around the 70th minute, then they’ll willpower a winner sometime after the 87th minute. And there is nothing Arsenal can do about it.”

The emergence of the Arsenal players for their warm-up is the cue for the home fans to pay tribute to Joe Root. The noise is quite something, especially as we’re still half an hour away from kick off.

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Luis Enrique’s fearlessness sets apart arguably the most watchable team in Europe after years of disappointment

Luis Enrique had one word to describe Gianluigi Donnarumma. “Sensationnel,” the Paris Saint-Germain manager said, switching briefly into French from his native Spanish; no translation required.

Donnarumma was the difference for PSG against Aston Villa on Tuesday night, the goalkeeper making five saves in the Champions League quarter-final second leg at Villa Park, three of them, well, sensational, as his team just about got the job done, losing 3-2 on the night having been 2-0 up but advancing 5-4 on aggregate.

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Villa fell just short of completing one of the great European comebacks with a rousing second-half display

1 min: McGinn loops a pass down the left for Rashford to chase. Hakimi shepherds the ball back to Donnarumma, who blooters clear. From the resulting throw, McGinn wins the first corner of the evening.

Villa kick off. They’re kicking towards the Holte End in this first half. It’s tipping down in Birmingham.

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Serhou Guirassy’s hat-trick gave Barcelona a scare but they held on to reach their first Champions League semi-final since 2019

The players gather round the centre circle to pay tribute to Dortmund legend Wilhelm Burgsmuller, who died last week aged 93.

A reminder of the teams

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• Manager wants Villa Park to be ‘a fortress’ on Tuesday
• Villa trail French champions 3-1 from first leg in Paris

Unai Emery urged his Aston Villa players to “write history” by recording a memorable comeback victory over Paris Saint-Germain to advance to the semi-finals of the Champions League. Villa must overturn a two-goal deficit after a first-leg defeat in France and the Villa manager doubled down on his belief that his side can cause a shock, with Emery adamant the “fortress” atmosphere at Villa Park on Tuesday can help his players find a winning formula.

Emery said PSG’s 3-1 lead does not alter the task at hand. “I have experiences coming back from results, positively and negatively,” he said. “Now it is something different, we want to write here the history with Aston Villa. Last year [we played] in the Conference League and this year in the Champions League and [now] hopefully for a long time in Europe. My experiences before were different … sometimes losing away and winning at home, sometimes losing at home and winning away. More winning than losing … but I had some negative experiences as well.”

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• Rice scored two free-kicks against Real Madrid
• Nicolas Jover had told him to cross the ball

Mikel Arteta has praised Declan Rice for his initiative after the midfielder ignored the instructions of Arsenal’s set-piece coach before scoring the first of his two free-kicks against Real Madrid.

Rice revealed that Nicolas Jover had been telling him to cross the ball rather than shoot in the 58th minute of the first leg of their Champions League quarter-final on Tuesday. Rice had never scored a free kick in 338 appearances but said Jover’s instructions “didn’t make sense” and opted to shoot instead after being encouraged by Bukayo Saka.

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Whether it’s Ed Sheeran at Ipswich, Michael McIntyre at Spurs or Hugh Grant and the Osman brothers at Fulham, celebrity fans always need to be on their very best behaviour, given the almost psychopathic obsession TV directors have with cutting away to them as the action on the pitch unfolds. Last night it was the turn of Prince William to find himself under constant surveillance in his VIP seat in nominative determinism’s Parc des Princes, where he and his son, George, were forced to abandon any plans they might have had to pick their noses, flick Vs at Paris Saint-Germain players or offer home fans out for a scrap on the concourse, for fear of being caught on camera and enjoying a surge in public popularity that no end of gladhanding elderly war veterans or official visits to former colonies could ever provide.

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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The quarter-finals got going with some sparkling highlights. We hand out honours and dishonours from the latest round of action

Arsenal

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PSG’s winger makes up his own moments – and he scored a beauty to set Luis Enrique’s side on course for victory

It took three minutes of the second half for Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, perhaps the most watchable footballer in Europe right now, to confirm the way this game was going.

Unai Emery had sent on Axel Disasi for Matty Cash at the break, with the score 1-1 and PSG hugely dominant on every metric. Cash was effectively doomed in this game from the moment he was booked pulling Kvaratskhelia back, just trying to stop the pain on Aston Villa’s right side, and already facing a case of terminal neck-crick from staring down at those shuffling feet. That was Cash’s fourth foul with just 17 minutes gone. Tick tock.

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Barcelona’s front three all scored, one of them twice, as they took control of their quarter-final against Borussia Dortmund

4 mins: Which is curled over the six-yard box and back out of play on the far side.

3 mins: Raphina finds space on the left, but Bensebaini clears his low cross for a corner.

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Khvicha Kvaratskhelia’s magnificent goal symbolised an awesome PSG performance that overwhelmed Villa

Marquinhos’s suspension means there are no thirtysomethings in the Paris Saint-Germain XI. No galacticos either. The players may be younger, but the team is all growns up

“I realise PSG may well hand out a good tonking tonight, but Villa’s bench is looking strong at least!” says Rob Knap. “Is it the strongest bench among the eight teams in the quarter finals? I’m not sure on what basis you can measure that really - so I suspect some people reading this who have seen a lot of, say, Hector Fort and Pablo Torre might disagree with that idea.”

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