The much-touted league stage of the new Champions League format is off to an interesting start. The first round of matches ended yesterday with 18 games played in different arenas across Europe. The games were a mix of massive wins, intense and heated ties as well as interesting upsets. Here are some of the takeaways from week 1 Champions League results:
Goals everywhere
Bayern Munich’s attacking firepower was unrestrained against Dinamo Zagreb, destroying the Croatian side in a 9-2 blowout. Harry Kane was a big part of the win, scoring four goals and winning the Man of the Match Award. Similarly, Celtic were in amazing form against Slovan Bratislava. The Scottish side won by five goals to one in a dominant performance. Bayer Leverkusen secured a convincing four-nil win while Borussia Dortmund, Sparta Prague and Aston Villa each won by three goals with a clean sheet.
Same old intensity
Many were sceptical about the expanded format of the Champions League and for good reasons. The intensity which made Champions League games interesting was at stake. But as we saw when Atalanta hosted Arsenal on Thursday, the competition is as intense as ever. With ball possession equally shared and both teams having just two shots on goal, it was a balanced affair. Neither Manchester City nor Inter could also get the better of each other in a keen contest that ended goalless. Even PSG’s dominant performance against Girona, the Spanish team’s defensive tenacity evened the pressure and the Frenchmen could only scrape a lone-goal win.
Barca upset
What’s a Champions League round without an upset? Barcelona who have been in wonderful form this season, winning all five of their La Liga games so far, fell to a 2-1 defeat at the hands of Monaco. To be fair, Monaco haven’t been performing badly, sitting in third place on the French Ligue 1 table. However, a Barca side falling on their very first European test is not something many of us signed up for.
Business as usual for Madrid?
Having what might be considered a slow start to the season, some might have expected Real Madrid to struggle on the big stage against VfB Stuttgart. And while the win wasn’t all comfortable, Madrid still asserted their European dominance with three goals to Stuttgart’s one. Mbappe scored on his Champions League debut for the Los Blancos, probably a foretaste of many more to come.
