⛅️ UCL Forecast: Euro giants descend on London, PSG on the brink at Bayern | OneFootball

Four Champions League quarter-final places will be decided from this midweek’s action.

This is what to look out for.

💪 Game of the week

Bayern Munich v PSG

One of the competition’s big favourites will fall by the wayside at this early stage as Bayern and PSG meet in Bavaria.

Like every game this week aside from Benfica v Club Brugge, a single goal separates the sides and, despite those similarities, this is arguably the game filled with the most jeopardy.

Bayern were victors in Paris last month but that result doesn’t tell the entire story of a game in which they were perhaps fortunate not to concede late on after Kylian Mbappé shrugged off his injury fears to return with a frightening second half cameo.

In the three games since then, PSG’s talisman has gone on to become the club’s record goalscorer, scoring five and assisting once during that run of games, as he comes into this one in scintillating form.

That alone will be enough to concern Bayern and Julian Nagelsmann, although his side have been much improved lately – aside from a blip in Mönchengladbach — and will consider themselves favourites at home.

It all makes this one such an intriguing contest. League titles are the least that is expected at these clubs, meaning the pressure will be at its peak in Bavaria. Who will hold their nerve?

📊 Fun fact: PSG are the only side left in the competition who have not kept a clean sheet this season and only twice before under the current format (since 2003) has a team reached the quarter-final while conceding in every game.

🔮 Our prediction: Bayern Munich 2-2 PSG

🤔 Too close to call

Tottenham v Milan

Neither of these sides have been at their best in 2023 and that’s putting it mildly.

Between them, they have managed to put together just 11 wins from their 25 games since the turn of the year, have been eliminated from their respective domestic cup competitions with surprise defeats and come into this on the back of losses away from home at the weekend.

And yet for all of those struggles for both, one of these teams will book their place in the quarter-final of the Champions League.

Milan won a low-quality contest 1-0 in the first leg at San Siro but have an appalling record in England, winning just one of their 21 trips there in European competition, losing their last three in London by an aggregate score of 9-1.

They do have the advantage heading into this one but Spurs have turned around two of the last three European ties that they trailed in at the halfway stage and in front of a sold-out, fervent crowd in north London, could do the same again, although Milan have shown flashes lately of the form that led them to the title this season.

It all makes this one thrillingly unpredictable.

📊 Fun fact: Despite Milan’s record in England, they have only been eliminated three times in this competition from the 21 occasions they have led after the first leg – against Feyenoord in 1969/70, Deportivo La Coruña in 2003/04 and Barcelona in 2012/13.

🔮 Our prediction: Tottenham 2-0 Milan

😨 Potential upset

Chelsea v Dortmund

Similarly to the game above, a European giant arrives in the English capital carrying a narrow first leg lead.

But Borussia Dortmund will likely arrive with a lot more confidence that they can finish the job than Milan will when they take on Tottenham.

After all, these sides are on vastly different trajectories in 2023. Since the bells rang out for new year, BVB have won every single game of football they’ve played — 10 in succession — scoring 25 goals in that time and conceding just eight.

Meanwhile, at Stamford Bridge, things aren’t quite as rosey in the garden for Graham Potter, who picked up a much-needed 1-0 win over struggling Leeds on Saturday to alleviate the pressure around his position, even if only slightly.

A surprise victory here could prove a potential turning point for him at Chelsea, who have just two wins from their 12 games this year. Their form has been abject during that time and they have managed just five goals in that span.

Form wise, everything points to one outcome. But in this competition the Blues can’t be completely counted out. We’ve seen it before.

📊 Fun fact: Dortmund’s Jude Bellingham could become the first Englishman in competition history to score in England against two different sides, having netted against Manchester City in the group stage.

🔮 Our prediction: Chelsea 0-1 Dortmund

🤩 Star man

João Mário (Benfica)

What a season the 30-year-old is having for Portugal’s runaway leaders.

Any animosities that may have been felt about signing a Sporting CP youth product have been forgiven by the Benfica support, with the ex-Inter man enjoying a superb individual campaign.

He has 19 goals and six assists from midfield in the league and Europe this season, with his best performances having been saved for the biggest stage.

If he scores against Brugge on Tuesday, he’ll become the first Benfica player since Eusébio to net in five successive European Cup/Champions League games, with the club icon doing so in seven from May 1963 until September 1964.