Europe’s most unpredictable, star-studded club competition is back. Three months, dozens of league games and one World Cup later, the UEFA Champions League will return to television sets around the globe Tuesday, with a round of 16 that lacks a singular favorite.
The first round of last year’s knockout stage saw giants like Juventus and Real Madrid fall in upsets. This year’s still leaves plenty of questions to be answered after a particularly wild group stage that saw the likes of Barcelona, Atlético Madrid and Juve go home empty-handed.
Is this the year domestic powers like Manchester City and Paris Saint-German finally break through? Could Napoli or Benfica make a shock run? Can any English team return to glory? Here’s a look at how the last 16 stacks up before things kick off Tuesday.
1. Bayern Munich
Round-of-16 matchup: Paris Saint-Germain
It may be contrarian to put anyone but the Citizens at the top of a list like this, but we’ll get to why City could run into trouble in a bit. At the top of the list of favorites is the German superclub. Yes, Bayern has won just one Champions League since 2013 despite being among the top spenders in the world. But this year’s team has rounded into form after a sluggish start.
The x-factor will be in goal. Bayern brought in Yann Sommer to replace Manuel Neuer, who suffered a broken leg in a skiing accident over the winter. The understudy will have to fill into the role in relatively uncharted territory—he’s previously played on five Champions League teams and never made it past the round of 16. The matchup with a banged-up PSG is sure to produce fireworks.
2. Manchester City
Round-of-16 matchup: RB Leipzig
What’s wrong with Manchester City? Some will say it’s striker Erling Haaland, which is probably an oversimplification of the team’s issues. But it’s clear things just aren’t clicking, particularly up front—Haaland had no touches in the opposing box in City’s loss to Tottenham last weekend.
Manchester City has lost twice in the Premier League (away to Manchester United and Tottenham) and drawn once (Everton) since the post–World Cup restart. That’s hardly a blip for most teams, but not for Pep Guardiola’s machine. That said, City is still one of the favorites to win the competition, if not the outright favorite. If Haaland can regain the form he’s displayed throughout his Champions League career, it’s doubtful anyone can stop him.
Ruben Albarran/ZUMA Wire/IMAGO
3. Real Madrid
Round-of-16 matchup: Liverpool
The title holders are playing second fiddle to Barcelona in La Liga, but there’s no denying they’re one of the favorites to repeat what is a relatively open competition. Last year’s run felt like something of an anomaly each round, until it ended with the Spanish giants’ hoisting their 14th European trophy. The unexplained magical run somehow turned into a title. But it will be hard to replicate once again.
Striker Karim Benzema looks to be back to his best after battling through injury for the first half of the season, scoring seven in nine matches since the World Cup. Los Blancos will have to shake off some iffy form in recent weeks to make another run in the competition it has dominated for decades.
4. Napoli
Round-of-16 matchup: Eintracht Frankfurt
The darling of European soccer poses a real threat to the superclubs in this competition. The runaway Serie A leaders proved their mettle since the restart, winning every match save for a 1–0 loss at Inter. No team in the entire continent is riding an unexpected high point of form like Napoli right now, and it all comes down to the forward duo of Victor Osimhen and Khvicha Kvaratskhelia.
Osimhen leads Serie A with 16 goals in 17 matches, thanks in large part to the play on the wing by Georgian sensation Kvaratskhelia—only Lionel Messi has more shot-creating actions per 90 minutes than the 21-year-old winger. It’s not outlandish to think Napoli could truly be this year’s dark horse to win the whole thing, particularly with a favorable round-of-16 matchup.
5. Paris Saint-Germain
Round-of-16 matchup: Bayern Munich
In an ideal world, the Parisian giants would be a clear favorite to march on to the quarterfinals and beyond. But this isn’t an ideal world. Superstar Kylian Mbappé will miss the first leg of the tie with Bayern due to a thigh injury. Messi’s status is in doubt as well after he suffered a hamstring injury. Couple that with a trio of losses since the Ligue 1 restart and an unfortunate matchup with Bayern, and trouble could be brewing in Paris.
The lack of a Champions League title has long been the white whale for one of Europe’s richest clubs. Can Neymar & Co. do enough in the first leg at the Parc de Princes before the star-studded reinforcements (likely) arrive for the second leg?
6. Benfica
Round-of-16 matchup: Club Brugge
You only need to look at the Portuguese side’s group-stage play to see why it could pose a real threat in this competition. Benfica dominated Maccabi Haifa twice, picked up two deserved wins over Juventus and went toe-to-toe with PSG in a pair of draws to win a group stacked with talent. It’s only lost one match all season in all competitions and has won 13 of its last 15. Thirty-year-old João Mário is in outstanding goalscoring form, having netted five in the club’s last three matches.
The biggest question mark is how it will cope with the loss of recently departed midfield maestro Enzo Fernández, who left for Chelsea on a Premier League record fee at the end of the January transfer window. Fernández was critical at controlling the tempo of the game and providing outstanding defensive cover, particularly against Europe’s top teams. A new midfield presence will have to step up for Benfica’s scorching form to continue.
7. Tottenham
Round-of-16 matchup: AC Milan
Spurs begin the list of English sides who have not yet been convincing this season. Tottenham’s UCL journey nearly ended in the group stage, and two second-half goals on the final match day vs. Marseille were just enough to send the London side through. But an up-and-down season has been marked by a lack of consistency—or dominance—throughout league and European play.
The question here is whether an Antonio Conte side can compete in the Champions League. His teams have picked up just 12 wins in 36 matches in UCL play over the years, and he’s made it past the round of 16 just once in five tries. Tottenham gets the edge here over the two remaining English sides because of its recent form (namely a win over Manchester City last weekend). A round-of-16 date with a struggling Milan side should help, too.
8. Liverpool
Round-of-16 matchup: Real Madrid
There are many different places to lay the blame on Liverpool’s early struggles this year, as manager Jürgen Klopp will gladly tell you. Injuries are one: Luis Díaz, Diogo Jota, Thiago, Virgil van Dijk, Roberto Firmino and Ibrahima Konaté have all missed time this season. The decline of James Milner, Jordan Henderson and Fabinho as viable veteran options hasn’t helped, either.
The Reds’ 4–1 Champions League rout at the hands of Napoli in September tells the story of a team that is still adjusting to life without Sadio Mané, who left for Bayern in the summer. This team is a far cry from the side that reached the final of this competition eight months ago. A rematch of that match in the round of 16 provides a difficult path forward.
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9. Inter Milan
Round-of-16 matchup: Porto
Inter Milan’s path to this point in the Champions League depicts right where one of Italy’s biggest teams sits at the moment. It’s capable of picking up huge results, like when it beat Barcelona 1–0, then managed a wild 3–3 draw in the return fixture. It has enough firepower to beat up on the minnows, like when it pounded Viktoria Plzen 6–0 on aggregate in two matches. But it can’t quite hang with the big boys, evidenced by two 2–0 losses to Bayern.
The positives: Inter has mostly rebounded from early-season struggles to rise back up to second in the Serie A table. Big wins in recent weeks over Napoli, AC Milan (twice) and Atalanta should give it enough confidence to make some noise, particularly with Lautaro Martínez back in form after a difficult World Cup.
10. Chelsea
Round-of-16 matchup: Borussia Dortmund
What will the Chelsea starting XI look like? Manager Graham Potter has almost too many tools to tinker with. The extraordinary winter transfer window resulted in record spending by owner Todd Boehly, headlined by the additions of Fernández from Benfica and Mykhailo Mudryk from Shakhtar Donetsk. Now comes the test of whether this will all pay off in the short term, or if it will need to punt on this season to commit to a long-term rebuild.
João Félix and Mudryk will add some bite to what’s been a toothless attack, and Fernández will greatly improve the midfield. But Potter doesn’t have much time to fix things if he wants to make a UCL run, with the fixture against Dortmund awaiting Wednesday.
11. Porto
Round-of-16 matchup: Inter Milan
Talk about a rebound. Porto looked doomed when it lost its first two Champions League matches by a combined score of 6–1. It proceeded to win its next four, conceding just one goal in the process. There are valid defensive concerns—opponents racked up 5.8 expected goals in those four wins—but this is a team that discovered how to win despite some instability on the back line. It’s suffered just one defeat in all competitions since October.
12. RB Leipzig
Round-of-16 matchup: Manchester City
New manager bounce or not, Marco Rose has Leipzig looking much improved from the side that started its UCL campaign with a pair of losses. Like Porto, the German side won four in a row to reach the round of 16. If it gets goalscoring extraordinaire Christopher Nkunku back from injury, Leipzig could pose some serious problems to City, particularly if Pep Guardiola’s team can’t sort out its own goalscoring issues.
13. Borussia Dortmund
Round-of-16 matchup: Chelsea
The feel-good story in world soccer right now comes out of the German club. Sébastian Haller returned from a long absence due to testicular cancer and scored in his second start with the club. American Gio Reyna is having his own renaissance of sorts after his post–World Cup drama, scoring late winners off the bench in two straight games. The vibes are good in Dortmund right now. Whether that will translate to a result against one of Europe’s richest teams is another story. It will be tough sledding for a team that has yet to display a real level of dominance over anyone this season.
Marco Canoniero/IMAGO
14. AC Milan
Round-of-16 matchup: Tottenham
The vibes are decidedly not good in Milan right now. Inter’s joint tenants at the San Siro have been absolutely abysmal in just about every way since the restart. Most worrying is the defensive record. In the span of 11 days, Milan lost 3–0 to Inter, 4–0 to Lazio and 5–2 to 15th-place Sassuolo. The only reprieve is a 1–0 win over Torino on Friday and the fact that it faces a Tottenham team that has largely failed to take hold of games against struggling opposition this season.
15. Eintracht Frankfurt
Round-of-16 matchup: Napoli
Frankfurt’s stunning run to a Europa League title was the story of European competition last season. Can it keep the magic going this season?
It certainly did in the group stage, when it turned a 1–0 second-half deficit to Sporting in the final match day into a 2–1 victory to reach the knockout stage. Randal Kolo Muani is in the midst of a breakout season, with 14 goals and 12 assists in all competitions. He’ll be critical if Frankfurt wants to play spoiler to Napoli’s dream season.
16. Club Brugge
It will be a tall task for the Belgian club to make any noise. It’s won just once since October, with, astonishingly, seven draws. That’s not the kind of form that leads to a miracle knockout-stage run, particularly when the club doesn’t have someone to lean on that can produce a goal out of nowhere. It would take a massive turnaround for Brugge to pull off any sort of surprise.
