Champions League

After having its match on Saturday postponed due to the coronavirus, PSG will now play its Champions League Round of 16 second leg against Borussia Dortmund behind closed doors at the Parc des Princes.

With the virus rapidly spreading through France, the French Police announced Monday that Wednesday’s Champions League match will take place with no fans present. The police and PSG’s Twitter accounts broke the news to fans and will now work out terms and conditions for refunds.

Liverpool goalkeeper Alisson Becker will miss Saturday's home Premier League game against Bournemouth as well as their Champions League clash against Atletico Madrid after suffering a hip injury this week, manager Juergen Klopp said on Friday.

The Brazilian was left out of the squad when Liverpool lost 2-0 at Chelsea in the FA Cup with Spaniard Adrian playing in goal instead and Klopp revealed he had injured his hip in training prior to Tuesday's game.

Juventus president Andrea Agnelli has questioned whether their smaller rivals Atalanta should have a right to play in the Champions League, saying they lack international history. His comments drew a blunt response from the mayor of Atalanta's home town Bergamo who said the team had earned their place with "sweat and imagination." 

UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin told European football's administrators on Tuesday that they can be proud to be in charge of the most popular, wealthiest and best football in the world.

In a surprisingly blunt message, the Slovenian told his organisation's annual congress that they should not be ashamed of the success of tournaments such as the Champions League and the Euros — nor the huge amount money they generate.

Juventus coach Maurizio Sarri is struggling to impose his style of play on the Turin side and his frustration came out into the open again after a poor performance in their Champions League defeat to Olympique Lyonnais on Wednesday. 

In comments that could be viewed as refreshingly honest or a risky public criticism of his players, the chain-smoking 61-year-old said that his team were struggling to grasp the concept of passing the ball around quickly — a style dubbed "Sarri-ball" by his admirers. 

Heading into Wednesday’s Champions League Round of 16 first leg between Real Madrid and Manchester City, the narrative centered around the contrasting styles of managers Zinedine Zidane and Pep Guardiola. In essence, how would the laissez-faire approach of Zidane, which yielded back-to-back-to-back titles in this competition between 2016 and 2018, fare against the meticulous neuroticism of Guardiola, which hasn’t earned the Spaniard Old Big Ears since 2011. 

Cristiano Ronaldo and Juventus traveled to the hallowed grounds of the Parc Olympique Lyonnais, home of the best women’s club team in Europe and the location of the USWNT’s 2019 Women’s World Cup triumph. 

The Italian Old Lady couldn’t live up to the ladies who have made the French stadium one of the Mecca’s of women’s football.

But Ronaldo made a funny face.

Well, I’ll be damned. Napoli didn’t lose and it’s all because of these fans, baby:

There’s a graphic doing the rounds that shows the 10 players with the most combined goals and assists in Europe’s top five leagues since August 2017. Lionel Messi is obviously miles ahead in the top spot, Luis Suárez is sixth and Neymar — despite only appearing in 52 games over that period — comes in 10th. 

It was only three seasons ago, but MSN seems a lifetime away. With a collection of arguably the world’s best No. 9, No. 10 and winger, there were endless variants to the ways in which Barcelona could go about killing you. 

Bayern Munich left back Alphonso Davies had himself a little battle with his opposite No. 19, Chelsea’s Mason Mount, on Tuesday. Well, he had a battle in the same way a child with a magnifying glass has a battle with ants on a sidewalk.

Davies toyed with the young Blues midfielder throughout the match, using his immense pace to recover on a couple occasions when it appeared Mount was in on goal. Then the Canadian teenager blistered past Mount and the entire Chelsea defense for the back-breaking goal in a 3-0 win in the Champions League Round of 16 at Stamford Bridge on Tuesday.