Champions League returns to the football scene with first UCL round of 16 1st leg matches this coming Tuesday.

UCL Round of 16 makes its sorely missed comeback. I’ve been counting days, for months now.

And finally it’s here! The football on the table this weekend from European leagues is very, VERY

UNDERWHELMING. With only one match that wakes up almost any interest in me. That match

being Liverpool vs Tottenham, check out more information from the last post dedicated to the

match.

UCL Round of 16 1st leg matches comes in batches of 2 matches on 4 match days. Those match

days and matches for the days are as follows:

Tuesday 14th of February:

Benfica vs BVB (Benfica 23/10 to win, BVB 6/5 to win by bet365)

PSG vs Barcelona (PSG 5/2 to win, Barcelona 11/10 to win by bet365)

Wednesday 15th of February

Bayern Munchen vs Arsenal

Real Madrid vs Napoli

Tuesday 21st of February

Bayer Leverkusen vs Atletico Madrid

Manchester City vs Monaco

Wednesday 22nd of February

Porto vs Juventus

Sevilla vs Leicester

The kick-off time for each and every UCL Round of 16 match is the same, 19.45(UK time). 4

Spanish teams, 3 English teams, 3 German teams, 2 teams from Portugal, 2 teams from France and

2 teams from Italy. I had a post way back when the group stages ended: That who out of those 16

teams to reach the UCL Round of 16 would eventually win the Champions League trophy. That

question still remains valid and unanswered.

How about those UCL Round of 16 match-ups then?

Each and every one of the UCL Round of 16 matches looks interesting in one way or another.

Maybe the most even and expected clash would be PSG vs Barcelona. There is basically no match-

up where you could directly name a team that will go through with 100% certainty. Sure you could

throw in Real Madrid, Bayern Munchen, Atletico Madrid, BVB and Sevilla. But it’s not that

simple, not in the UCL Round of 16.

Another example, many/most people would consider Manchester City a BIG favourite over

Monaco. But that is nothing but over-estimation of Manchester City and under-estimation of

Monaco. Monaco has actually scored the most goals in any top5 european leagues, by a boatload.

And they play very entertaining football, with a solid mixture of youth and experience. We’ve all

seen Manchester City play this season, at times they are good, at times they are just awful. In UCL

Round of 16 you need to be consistent for 180minutes or you’re out of the tournament.

The most “un-even” match-up would seem to be Leverkusen vs Atletico. In terms of past success

anyway, Atletico is the clear favourite. Form wise, it would seem to be much more even battle, but

still in favour of Atletico. Besides UCL Round of 16 seems to be the last stop for german teams,

other than BVB and Bayern, in recent years.

The UCL Round of 16 matches coming up on Tuesday 14th of February should be fireworks all around

Benfica vs BVB, might not look like the most interesting match-up on paper, ironically it will be

one of the most entertaining match-ups in Champions League knockout stages. Both teams play

with extremely attacking style, almost identically. Using fast counterattacks to their benefit, but also

having the ability to go slow when needed. Both teams boast scary amounts of individual skill,

despite Benfica selling few of their most promising players in Summer and January transfer

window’s. BVB might have some better known players, in Marco Reus, Pierre-Emerick

Aubameyang and Mario Götze.

Benfica also has a wide range of talent, Rafa Silva, Nelson Semedo and Victor Lindelöf the most

promising young players. Mixed with experience of Julio Cesar, Luisao, Eliseu and Jonas Benfica is

a healthy mixture of youth and experience. If they could have kept some of the players in last two-

three years, Benfica might be one of the favourites to win Champions League. This time around

though, its hard to say whos going to win the UCL Round of 16 match between Benfica and BVB,

but its going to very entertaining match-up.

PSG vs Barcelona, UCL round of 16. Maybe the most

expected clash of them all

PSG vs Barcelona: This one should be very interesting match-up. If PSG can hold their ground this

time around, who knows what they can achieve. They lost Zlatan, and for a long time it looked like

the club was heading nowhere after losing their talisman. But as of late, they have found that

rhythm again.

Now PSG would be VERY interesting team to follow-up after the winter transfer window, where

they bought Goncalo Guedes from Benfica. But im pretty sure Guedes is cup bound as he already

represented Benfica in Champions League this season. And therefore cant represent another team in

the competition, thats a shame really. One of the most promising young forwards in the world right

now.

Another, maybe even more high-profile player PSG purchased in the winter transfer window is

Julian Draxler. If i remember correctly, Draxler’s last club, Wolfsburg didn’t qualify to Champions

League last season, so he might not be cup-tied and available to play this Wednesday. That is good

news for PSG. The lineup of PSG is among the best in Europe, the problem for them has been

turning that individual skill into team performance. If they can do it this time around, anything is

possible in the match vs Barcelona. If not…

Then Barcelona will eat PSG for breakfast. It’s that simple. Barcelona is struggling in La Liga

(well, not really struggling, but they are 1 point behind Real Madrid who has 2 matches in hand),

but their feared “MSN” strike force can annihilate any given opponent on any given day. In fact

usually it only takes one of the three, where 2 of them are misfiring, one decides a match with

individual skill. Out of the best 5 players in the world, you could argue that the three Barcelona

strikers are all among the top5.

It’s a scary situation for PSG, but if they can contain the “MSN” it’s a considerably easier match to

win. The keys to achieve that? Who knows! Well, there is Marco Verratti, personally one of my

favourite midfielders in the game(only behind Luka Modric). If there is one man who can disrupt

the flow of Barcelona in this match, it’s Verratti. Pari him up with Grezgorz Krychowiak(former

Sevilla midfielder) and they will wreak havok on that Barcelona front line.

Either way, PSG vs Barcelona will be one of the most interesting UCL round of 16 matches. The

only decision is which match to watch, as all of the matches are being played at the same time…