The first English football team, Manchester City, the defending champion, reached the quarter-finals of the European Champions League football competition, after renewing its victory with the same first-leg result over its guest, Copenhagen, Denmark, 3-1, on Wednesday in the second leg of the eighth final.
City settled the match in the first half by scoring three goals through Swiss defender Manuel Akanji (5), Argentine Julián Alvarez (9), and Norwegian Erling Haaland (45 + 3), while Norwegian of Moroccan origin Mohamed Elyounoussi scored Copenhagen’s goal (29).
Spaniard Pep Guardiola made seven changes to his squad compared to the first leg, resting Belgian playmaker Kevin De Bruyne and Phil Foden, who scored two goals from the hat-trick in the 3-1 win over United in the Manchester derby, in preparation for the fiery confrontation that will bring together his team, second in the league, with leaders Liverpool.
At Etihad Stadium, City opened the scoring 5 minutes after the starting whistle, after a corner kick taken by Alvarez and followed by Akanji on the bird past Polish goalkeeper Kamil Grabara, who did not move a finger.
Copenhagen had barely recovered from the first goal before they received the second in a similar scenario after a corner kick from Alvarez was converted by the Brazilian Rodri with his head hitting the crossbar, so the ball returned to the Qatar World Cup champion, who shot it through a through ball from outside the area, but Grabara failed to deal with it, hitting his hands and hitting his net (9).
It is Alvarez’s fifth goal in five Champions League matches this season.
Copenhagen refused to give up, as they scored the goal of reducing the difference with the first shot between the three sticks, which came from a counterattack, and after an exchange of the ball between Elyounoussi and the Icelander, Uri Oscarsson, the latter passed it with his heel to the former, who was alone with the goalkeeper and put it into the net (29), in his third goal in the continental competition of the season. Current and ninth in various competitions.
Before the referee blew the whistle at the end of the first half, City raised their lead to three goals in the third minute of stoppage time, after the giant Haaland was on time to score the net with a creeping shot after a pass from Rodri passed between the goalkeeper’s feet.
In the second half, which witnessed several changes for City, most notably the exit of the trio Rodri, Portuguese Ruben Diash, and Haaland, City’s Brazilian goalkeeper Ederson blocked a strong ball from substitute Magnus Mattsson (66), before the crossbar deprived young defender Rico Luis of the fourth goal for the defending champion (90+2). .
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