The favourites
Bayern Munich
Dumped out of last season’s tournament in the quarter-finals by Paris Saint-Germain, Bayern kicked off this campaign with a breezy 3-0 win at Barcelona and did not look back, winning their five remaining group games to finish as group winners for the fourth season running.
Propelled, as ever, by the goals of Robert Lewandowski — who has nine in the tournament this term — Bayern retain all the experience and firepower that took them to Champions League glory in 2020, while their defence has been bolstered by the arrival from RB Leipzig of Dayot Upamecano, the highly regarded French centre back.
Chelsea
Of all the stand-out results in the group phase, few will have sent shockwaves rumbling across Europe in the same manner as Chelsea’s 4-0 demolition of Juventus on matchday five. On a memorable night at Stamford Bridge, goals from Trevoh Chalobah, Reece James, Callum Hudson-Odoi and Timo Werner condemned Juventus to their heaviest defeat of the Champions League era.
Magomed Ozdoyev’s 94th-minute equaliser for Zenit Saint Petersburg in Wednesday’s 3-3 draw tipped the defending champions into second place in group H, so they will not be seeded in Monday’s draw. Nevertheless, none of the group winners will want to see Thomas Tuchel’s men come out of the hat.
Liverpool
It was a measure of the ease with which Liverpool sailed into the round of 16 that Jürgen Klopp was able to rest a whole host of star players for his side’s final group game and still saw them seal a 2-1 away win over AC Milan, the Serie A leaders.
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Making a mockery of group B’s status as the supposed “group of death”, the six-times European champions became the first English side to win all six of their Champions League group games. With both having shone in the group phase, Liverpool fans will hope that Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mané do not return too jaded from next month’s Africa Cup of Nations if Liverpool are to attack the last 16 at full pelt.
Manchester City
After the bitter disappointment of losing last season’s final, Pep Guardiola’s side showed that they remain a force to be reckoned with by comfortably topping group A above PSG, Leipzig and Club Bruges.
In the absence of a regular first-choice striker, City spread their 18 group-stage goals between nine different players, plus one own goal, although the lack of an attacking focal point cost them in their 2-0 defeat at PSG on matchday two, when Guardiola’s side failed to make their territorial dominance count.
Their tally of ten goals conceded, however, stands in stark contrast to last season, when they let in only one goal en route to the knockout phase.
The contenders
Ajax
Ajax rekindled memories of their stunning surge to the semi-finals in 2019 by romping into the knockout rounds with six wins from six. Sébastien Haller, derided as a flop after an underwhelming 18-month spell at West Ham United, was one of the stars of the group phase, becoming the quickest player to hit ten goals in the Champions League.
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Frenkie de Jong and Matthijs de Ligt may have moved on, but with Haller, the Southampton old boy Dusan Tadic, the Dutch winger Steven Berghuis and the talented Brazilian creator Antony in his ranks, Erik ten Hag as coach has one of the most dangerous attacks in the competition.
Manchester United
Ralf Rangnick’s recent appointment as interim manager makes United one of the most intriguing teams in the draw.
The 63-year-old German has already given some indications of how he intends to turn United’s season around, introducing a new 4-2-2-2 formation and bringing more co-ordination and intensity to the team’s work without the ball.
With a benign run of games to come in the Premier League, United may hit full speed by the time the competition resumes. And in Cristiano Ronaldo, they have the most effective knockout-phase player that the Champions League has ever seen.
PSG
The French giants’ lavish summer recruitment drive led to them being heralded as Champions League favourites but Mauricio Pochettino’s side do not yet seem the full sum of their parts. Whether in Ligue 1, where they sit 11 points clear at the summit, or in the Champions League, PSG tend to beat teams by dint of individual brilliance rather than dashing collective football.
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One bright spot in the Champions League has been the form of their superstar signing Lionel Messi, who belied an underwhelming start to life in Ligue 1 to find the net five times in the group phase.
Real Madrid
The Moldovan minnows Sheriff Tiraspol created a sensation by winning at the Bernabéu on matchday two, but it proved to be the only setback in an otherwise straightforward path to the last 16 for Real.
The team may still hinge upon the ageless midfield trio of Toni Kroos, Luka Modric and Casemiro, but Éder Militão and David Alaba have successfully established a new-look partnership in defence and the jet-heeled forward Vinícius Júnior is enjoying a breakthrough season alongside the indomitable Karim Benzema.
With Carlo Ancelotti back at the helm no other team in the competition possesses as much Champions League experience.
The dark horses
Atletico Madrid
Three straight defeats — against Liverpool, twice, and AC Milan — left Atletico staring down the barrel of a group-stage exit, but the Spanish champions pulled off a smash-and-grab 3-1 win away to Porto in their last game to squeeze into the knockout phase.
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Domestically, Atletico’s vaunted defensive solidity has deserted them, which has contributed to Diego Simeone’s side finding themselves ten points behind Real, the leaders, albeit with a game in hand. But the spirited victory over Porto, with a patched-up back line, suggested that they had not lost their well-known knack for rising to the occasion.
Benfica
Benfica created headlines by qualifying for the round of 16 at the expense of Xavi’s Barcelona in Group E, but they deservedly finished above the Catalan giants, having beaten them 3-0 when the sides met in Lisbon in September.
Benfica’s shortcomings were nevertheless exposed in a bruising double-header against Bayern, who put nine goals past Jorge Jesus’s side in two games. With Benfica lagging behind Porto and Sporting in the Portuguese title race, qualification for the last 16 has provided some breathing room for Jesus and Rui Costa, the recently appointed club president.
Inter Milan
Despite losing Antonio Conte, architect of last season’s Serie A title triumph, and a number of key players last summer, Inter have reached the Champions League knockout phase for the first time in a decade.
Edin Dzeko, signed on a free transfer from Roma, has proved an inspired replacement for Romelu Lukaku, while his fellow new recruits Denzel Dumfries and Hakan Calhanoglu have also settled quickly. Had Simone Inzaghi’s men showed more of a cutting edge in front of goal, they might even have challenged Real for top spot in group D.
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Juventus
The Champions League has provided a welcome distraction for Juventus, who already find themselves 11 points off the pace in the Serie A title race. Although Massimiliano Allegri’s men often failed to convince in the group phase, they successfully accumulated hard-fought 1-0 wins over Chelsea, Zenit and Malmo.
Topping the group above Chelsea theoretically guarantees them a kinder draw but nobody at the club will need reminding that it was after finishing top of their group that they fell to Lyons and Porto in the last 16 in each of the last two seasons.
The outsiders
Lille
Lille sustained the magic of last season’s shock Ligue 1 title success by topping their group to reach the knockout rounds for the first time since 2006-07. While their league title defence was over before it had begun, the Champions League has given the team from northern France a stage on which to reproduce the formula that swept them to domestic glory last season: a solid defence, a dogged attitude and clinical finishing.
Without a win after their first three games, they reeled off victories over Seville, Salzburg and Wolfsburg to go through, with the in-form Canada striker Jonathan David finding the net on each occasion.
Salzburg
In finishing behind Lille in group G, Salzburg became the first Austrian team to progress beyond the group stage since Sturm Graz in 2000-01.
Matthias Jaissle’s young side play aggressive, front-foot football and will approach the knockout rounds with nothing to lose. With 15 goals in all competitions this season, Karim Adeyemi, the 19-year-old Germany international, is the latest exciting youngster to emerge from the club’s vaunted production line.
Sporting
Sporting claimed the sizeable scalp of Borussia Dortmund in group C, condemning Erling Haaland and his team-mates to the Europa League by virtue of a better goal difference across their head-to-head encounters.
Things looked bleak for Rúben Amorim, the 36-year-old coach, and his charges after consecutive losses to Ajax and Dortmund, but his youthful team fought back to take the club into the knockout phase for only the second time. The attacking midfielder Pedro Gonçalves was their key man, scoring braces in vital home wins over Besiktas and Dortmund.
Villarreal or Atalanta
The postponement of Wednesday night’s decisive final group F game due to heavy snow in Bergamo meant that there was one place in the last 16 draw still to be decided.
Villarreal, despite their poor form meaning they have sunk to 13th in La Liga, progressed at the expense of Serie A side Atalanta.
