Champions League round of 16: the contenders reviewed and ranked

Posted Monday, December 15, 2014 by theguardian.com

Champions League round of 16: the contenders reviewed and ranked
Will anyone be able to stop Gareth Bale and Real Madrid from powering through once more?

1 Real Madrid
The holders sailed through with the only 100% record in the group stage and were rarely extended, although Ludogorets provided some novelty by taking the lead on matchday two. A 5-1 win over Basel was an emphatic start to their defence and Liverpool were swept aside contemptuously at Anfield. Cristiano Ronaldo’s form this season has been such that five goals in six games suggested he was keeping his powder dry; Karim Benzema, now undoubtedly one of the world’s best, matched his tally this time.

2 Bayern Munich
Matters were similarly straightforward for Bayern, who might have expected more of a challenge from a combination of Roma and Manchester City. The former were taken apart with an astonishing 7-1 evisceration in their own stadium on matchday three, and offered little resistance in Munich two weeks later as Bayern qualified with two games to spare. The only surprise was that, at the end of a breathtaking performance with 10 men at the Etihad, Bayern let Sergio Agüero in twice to offer some hope that they are vulnerable.

3 Barcelona
Barcelona grew in conviction during a group stage campaign that, if nothing else, should be celebrated for the hat-trick against APOEL that made Lionel Messi the competition’s all-time top scorer. Messi provided eight goals in the six matches and, although an unconvincing home win against the Cypriots and a 3-2 defeat by PSG sounded a few alarm bells at the start, the list of scorers – Messi, Neymar and Luis Suárez – in Wednesday’s 3-1 win over the French side had an ominous ring to it.

4 FC Porto
Porto qualified impressively even if BATE Borisov, cannon fodder who would go on to concede more goals than any previous group stage competitor, provided the ideal start by folding 6-0 on matchday one. Jackson Martínez and Yacine Brahimi were the stars, both scoring in a convincing 2-0 win at Athletic Bilbao, and Vincent Aboubakar’s late equaliser on Wednesday in a dead rubber against second-placed Shakhtar ensured that, as in their domestic league, they remained unbeaten.

5 Chelsea
Chelsea were the highest goalscorers in the group stage, with 17. The figure was propped up by a 6-0 win over Maribor and an exceptional performance that saw five goals put past Schalke in Gelsenkirchen. The rest of their work, which was effectively done by the final matchday, was more functional than flashy but this is a Chelsea side that seems to have the different means of winning that are required in this competition.

6 Atlético Madrid
Last season’s runners-up received an early shock against Olympiakos in Piraeus, perhaps dulled by the exertions of a derby win over Real three days previously. Their subsequent performances have marked a rejigged side out as a force for this year’s knockouts too: a home win and away draw against Juventus, whom they had already all but pipped to first place in the group before the final matchday, were encouraging and Mario Mandzukic’s five goals give further cause for optimism.

7 Borussia Dortmund
Dortmund’s domestic travails are well documented but few on the European stage have an answer to their intensity and they had qualified by the end of matchday four. A whirlwind of a performance at home to Arsenal and successive four-goal hauls against Galatasaray were particularly noteworthy and, while there were wobbles in their final two games, it is reasonable to think that a full-strength side will still trouble anyone.

8 Arsenal
Arsenal supporters can invariably be promised knock-out stage tickets for Christmas in good faith and despite some precarious sub-plots there was never too much risk of anything different this year. Defeat in Dortmund was deserved, a win over Anderlecht was not and the 3-3 draw with the Belgians showed exactly why Arsenal will not win the competition, but they blew Galatasaray away in convincing fashion twice and outplayed an already-qualified German side at the Emirates.

9 Monaco
Monaco have not convinced anyone in Ligue 1 this season so their table-topping progress from what looked the toughest group to rank from one to four caught the eye – even if most of the games themselves, only five goals scored in them, did not. They saved their best until last with a 2-0 win over Zenit St Petersburg, and conceded only once – against Benfica – but will probably require a benevolent draw in the last 16.

10 Paris St-Germain
Laurent Blanc’s side would have won Group F if they had held Barcelona at Camp Nou on Wednesday but their qualification was already certain and, particularly at home, PSG once again look potent enough to give anyone a game in the knock-outs. The 3-2 win over Barça on matchday two was seen as potentially a seminal moment for the forward-looking Parisians and, if Edinson Cavani can add to the five goals he scored in their group, they may be able to look forward to more.

11 Manchester City
How do you rank Manchester City’s achievement when balancing their barnstorming final two games against the ludicrousness of the position they had found themselves in? By placing them somewhere in the middle, because the jury must still be out on their capability to perform consistently against sides that, man for man, they should feel equal to. They handled a high-pressure situation in Rome well but perhaps Agüero’s late brace against Bayern Munich has relieved the evident, and slightly strange, tension around their European outings.

12 Shakhtar Donetsk
Shakhtar have done superbly to ride out the appalling situation in their home region and reach the knock-out stages. Forced to play their home games in Lviv, around 750 miles from their intimidating Donbass Arena, Mircea Lucescu’s team drew creditably with Porto and in Bilbao before perhaps benefiting from facing BATE in the often decisive matchday three/four double header. They scored 12 goals in those two games, 12 of which came from the Brazilian striker Luiz Adriano.

13 Juventus
It is difficult to gauge the current strength of Serie A, and their leaders were not a glowing advertisement even if they were effectively through to the last 16 before matchday six. Only one win in their matches against Atlético Madrid and Olympiakos – a 3-2 comeback win at home against the Greeks – is not a statistic that gives particular room for optimism even if Carlos Tevez, who scored three times, can clearly still trouble the best.

14 Bayer Leverkusen
A solid performance from Roger Schmidt’s side, which cranked into gear with good home wins over Benfica and Zenit after losing to Monaco on matchday one. A subsequent victory in St Petersburg, the dangerous Son Heung-min scoring twice, was their most impressive feat of the six games and proved decisive in edging the Russians into the Europa League but Group C was underwhelming overall and they will face better opponents in the next round.

15 Schalke 04
If Sporting Lisbon had turned up against a weakened Chelsea side at Stamford Bridge, then perhaps Schalke would not be blocking out their diaries for February. They did enough but 14 goals conceded and a goal difference of minus five does not augur particularly well and the way in which Chelsea picked them off at the Veltins-Arena in matchday five may play on a few minds. If nothing else, they do have a manager with some top-notch Champions League previous in the form of Roberto Di Matteo.

16 FC Basel
The Swiss side’s achievement – a second qualification for the knock-out phase – should not be underestimated although it was a curiosity that they progressed from Group B with a negative record. It said something for Paulo Sousa’s highly watchable side that they held their nerve on a decisive European night at Anfield, and they impressed in beating Liverpool at home, but the all-conquering strength of Real Madrid and the relative weakness of their other two opponents probably combined in their favour.