Champions League: Top favorites Real Madrid and Manchester City surprisingly lose

Real Madrid have already suffered their second defeat of this Champions League season. The defending champions lost 1:3 (1:2) against AC Milan. Title favorites Manchester City and coach Pep Guardiola also had to surprisingly admit defeat and lost clearly 1:4 (1:1) at Sporting Lisbon.

In a balanced first half at Real, Milan took the lead through German central defender Malick Thiaw after a corner (12th), before Vinícius Júnior equalized with a converted penalty kick (23rd). Ex-Madrilenian Álvaro Morata put the guests in the front again with a goal before the break (39′). Tijjani Reijnders completed the deserved away win in the 73rd minute. With six points from four games, Real are only in the middle of the table after half of the preliminary round and have to worry about direct qualification for the round of 16.

Despite the defeat, Manchester City is high in the table

It was also a bitter defeat for Man City. Phil Foden scored the early 1-0 for the English champions (4th), but they missed further chances. Guardiola’s team got the reward for this through Viktor Gyökeres, who completed a counterattack with the flattering equalizer (38th). And things got even worse for the guests: First Maxi Araujo scored (46th), then Gyökeres increased the score with a penalty (49th). With his third goal – again from a penalty – the Swede made the final score (81st). Erling Haaland had previously hit the crossbar with a penalty for City. Manchester is still in the top third of the table with seven points.

Meanwhile, at the very other end of the table is RB Leipzig. After a 1:3 defeat at Celtic Glasgow, the Bundesliga club has serious concerns about progressing in the Champions League. The Saxons deserved to lose and are without any points after four games. The main role was played by a former youth player from RB: the former German junior international Nicolas Kühn, who became a Celtic professional this year, scored two goals.

By Editor