The Champions League round of 16 starts Tuesday with blockbuster rematches, teams ending long absences from this stage and the feelgood story of newcomer Bodø/Glimt.
Paris Saint-Germain on Wednesday hosts a Chelsea team which last July stopped the Champions League winner adding the Club World Cup title.
Real Madrid hosts Manchester City for the second time this season and the fifth straight year in the knockout rounds. In three of those years, the winner went on to lift the trophy.
Madrid-Man City also is one of three round of 16 pairings that already played a few months ago in the opening league phase.
Back in September, Galatasaray beat Liverpool in Istanbul and Barcelona left Newcastle with all three points.
Galatasaray and Newcastle are playing Champions League games in March for the first time in, respectively, 12 and 23 years. Atalanta hosts Bayern Munich five years since last reaching the round of 16.
Bodø/Glimt has ended Norway’s 29-year wait to be represented this deep in the competition, when Rosenborg advanced to the quarterfinals from a smaller 16-team group stage.
Bodø/Glimt now hosts Sporting Lisbon on its artificial turf field inside the Arctic Circle where Man City and Inter Milan both were beaten 3-1 in recent months.
The forecast temperature at kickoff is 3 Celsius (37 Fahrenheit) in the Norwegian Sea fishing town.
Mbappé vs. Haaland?
Pep Guardiola’s team already won at the Santiago Bernabéu stadium in December. Erling Haaland’s penalty before half time settled a 2-1 win as Madrid’s superstar forward Kylian Mbappé stayed on the bench.
Mbappé is a doubt again for Wednesday because of a strain injury in his left knee.
“It’s under control, every day he’s better,” Madrid coach Álvaro Arbeloa said last week. “Right now, it’s all good news.”
There are just six days between the first leg and the return game in Manchester, though Mbappé and Haaland have another chance to meet this season.
At the World Cup, France plays Norway in the final round of Group I games June 26 at the New England Patriots’ stadium near Boston.
Champions duel
PSG vs. Chelsea has the feel of a true Champions League rivalry though it is 10 years since they met in the competition.
That was also in the round of 16 when the coaches in 2016 were Laurent Blanc and Guus Hiddink respectively. A PSG team featuring Zlatan Ibrahimović won home and away in what was the third straight year the clubs met in the knockout phase.
Their most recent meeting eight months ago was a surprise 3-0 win for Chelsea — then coached by Enzo Maresca — at MetLife Stadium near New York inspired by Cole Palmer.
Chelsea’s coach is now Liam Rosenior who started the season as a French league rival of PSG at Strasbourg.
European final history
Just one of the eight pairings this week is a rematch of any UEFA final since the European Cup started in 1955. Few will recall it.
The 1963 European Cup-Winners’ Cup final was a 5-1 win for Tottenham over Atletico Madrid played in Rotterdam. It is also the only time they previously met.
There is some familiarity for Tottenham because Atletico’s Metropolitano stadium is where the North London club lost the 2019 Champions League final against Liverpool.
Atletico won just one of its last 10 UEFA competition matches against English opponents, though on Tuesday hosts the 16th-place team in the Premier League having a chaotic season.
Tottenham’s interim coach Igor Tudor is the club’s 12th different full- or part-time hire since Atletico got Diego Simeone more than 14 years ago.
Unlucky top spot?
Finishing top in the 36-team standings did not work out one year ago for Liverpool, which was eliminated in the round of 16 by PSG.
Arsenal led the way this time as the top-seeded team paired in the bracket with 16th-seeded Bayer Leverkusen, which hosts the first leg Wednesday. The lowest-ranked team left in the competition is Bodø/Glimt, which squeezed into the knockout playoffs in 23rd place.
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