A pair of spectacular hat trick performances by two veterans highlighted a memorable slate of UEFA Champions League games from Tuesday and Wednesday. The second half of the eight-team field will be completed with next week’s final round-of-16 matches, but here’s what stood out from this week’s games.
Benzema’s hat trick for Real sinks PSG
Sitting on a 1-0 lead over Real Madrid from the first leg in France last month, Paris Saint-Germain looked to have booked its spot into the quarterfinals when Kylian Mbappe scored late in the first half in Wednesday’s return match in Spain.
Mbappe’s strike meant Real needed three goals to win the aggregate series, and as PSG continued to press the issue at the start of the second half, a comeback by los blancos looked increasingly unlikely.
But then Real forward Karim Benzema torched PSG for three goals to turn the game completely on its head and send the Spaniards through to the next round at the expense of Lionel Messi and his cohorts.
It was Benzema’s hard work off the ball that forced a giveaway by PSG goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma in the 61st minute that led to the French forward scoring to tie the game. In the 76th minute, Benzema bagged a second goal off a feed from Luka Modric, and then two minutes later sealed his team’s come-from-behind victory with a sublime one-time finish with the outside of his foot.
It was an amazing 17-minute span by Benzema, who at 34 years and 80 days became the oldest player to ever score a hat trick in the Champions League. The Frenchman also has 309 career goals for Real, moving him past club icon Alfredo Di Stefano for third place on the club’s all-time list.
Benzema’s name doesn’t get mentioned nearly enough in discussions about the best player in the world, but the Frenchman has continually come up huge in big moments throughout his career. Wednesday’s performance just served as another reminder. “I don’t care that he’s from Madrid. What a player, what a player Benzema!” FC Barcelona defender Dani Alves posted on social media after the game.
Bayern’s Lewandowski a one-man wrecking crew
Hell hath no fury like Robert Lewandowski scorned. Bayern Munich’s Polish forward was kept off the scoresheet in a disappointing 1-1 draw against Red Bull Salzburg in the first leg last month – and he didn’t even record a single shot on net, and he registered just one touch of the ball inside the opponent’s penalty area.
But the Austrians felt the full wrath of Lewandowski’s scoring prowess in Tuesday’s return match in Germany, as the lanky forward scored three goals and collected an assist in Bayern’s 7-1 destruction of Salzburg. It took Lewandowski just 12 minutes to score his first, converting from the penalty spot after being brought down by Maximilian Wober.
The defender fouled him again and the Bayern forward scored on a second penalty in the 21st. Lewandowski completed his hat trick just two minutes later, beating onrushing goalkeeper Philipp Köhn with a shot from the edge of the 18-yard box.
In doing so, Lewandowski set a new record for the quickest hat trick from the start of a Champions League match, eclipsing the old mark of 24 minutes by AC Milan’s Marco Simone against Rosenborg in 1996. Bayern’s 8-2 aggregate victory means they have qualified for the Champions League quarter-finals a record 20 times.
Tuesday: 33-year old forward Robert Lewandowski scores hat-trick
Wednesday: 34-year old forward Karim Benzema scores hat-trick
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— UEFA Champions League (@ChampionsLeague) March 9, 2022
Liverpool survive Italian threat at Anfield to advance
Liverpool was second-best on Tuesday and ended up on the wrong end of a 1-0 decision against Inter Milan. But the loss, the Reds’ first in any competition at Anfield in a year, was enough to see them advance on aggregate after winning 2-0 in Italy last month in the first leg. Prior to this week, Liverpool had won each of its previous three encounters against Inter in the Champions League without conceding a single goal.
But the Italians bossed their English counterparts at Anfield right from the kick off, with industrious play of Chilean midfielder Arturo Vidal causing the hosts plenty of problems.
Inter’s hard work was rewarded just after the hour mark when Lautaro Martinez unleashed a swerving shot that nestled into the back of the net and gave the visitors hope. But any chance of an Italian comeback was halted a mere two minutes later when Alexis Sanchez earned his second yellow card for his follow-through tackle on Liverpool’s Fabinho.
Now reduced to 10 men, Inter lost control of the match to Liverpool, who came close to scoring through Mohamed Salah and Luis Diaz. Liverpool ended up doing enough to advance to the quarter-finals, but Inter’s gutsy display and the tactical approach of Simone Inzaghi at Anfield earned the respect of Reds manager Jurgen Klopp. “Compliments to Inter and to Inzaghi. He has a really strong team, tactically hard to play,” Klopp told Sky Sport Italia after the game.
Scott Carson makes history for Manchester City
Manchester City romped to a 5-0 win over Sporting in Lisbon last month in the first leg, which firmly put them in the driver’s seat going into Wednesday’s match.
With the result never in doubt, Blues manager Pep Guardiola brought off starting goalkeeper Ederson in the 73rd minute and replaced him with third-choice Scott Carson, who maintained the clean sheet in a 0-0 draw.
Carson, 36, had not played in the Champions League since turning out as a 19-year-old for Liverpool in a 2-1 win over Juventus in April, 2005.
Wednesday’s brief cameo came 16 years and 338 days after playing for Liverpool, making it the largest gap between appearances for a single player in the competition’s history.
About the author: John Molinaro is one of the leading soccer journalists in Canada, having covered the game for over 20 years for several media outlets, including Sportsnet, CBC Sports and Sun Media. He is currently the editor-in-chief of TFC Republic, a website dedicated to in-depth coverage of Toronto FC and Canadian soccer. TFC Republic can be found here.
Champions League Takeaways: Benzema and Lewandowski prove age is just a number
Source: Pinas Ko Mahal
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