UEFA Champions League
Tottenham’s Van de Ven scores 90-metre solo goal
London, Nov 5: Bayern Munich and Liverpool won the blockbuster matchups in the Champions League. Micky van de Ven might have already scored the competition’s goal of the season.
With a 2-1 win at defending champion Paris Saint-Germain, Bayern made it 16 straight victories in all competitions to underline its status as perhaps the new leading force in European football.
Real Madrid came unstuck at Anfield for the second straight season, losing 1-0 to Liverpool as Trent Alexander-Arnold – jeered on his every touch – endured a miserable return to his long-time former club.
Midway through the fourth round of league-stage games, only Bayern and Arsenal are on a maximum 12 points. Arsenal swept to a 3-0 win at Slavia Prague, bringing 15-year-old Max Dowman off the bench to make him the youngest player in Champions League history.
The moment of the night fell to Van de Ven, the lanky Tottenham defender who set off on a mazy, 90-metre run from the edge of his own area to score the team’s third goal in a 4-0 win over FC Copenhagen.
“It was like Lionel Messi transformed into a centre back,” Tottenham manager Thomas Frank said.
Mixed fortunes for Diaz
Bayern oozed quality in the first half before showing resilience in the second half to hold on with 10 men at the Parc des Princes on a night of mixed fortunes for Luis Diaz.
The former Liverpool winger produced clinical finishes in the fourth and 32nd minutes to power the German champions into a 2-0 lead, only to mar his display with a reckless lunge from behind on PSG right back Achraf Hakimi in first-half stoppage time.
Diaz was sent off after a VAR review and Hakimi hobbled out of the game with an injured left ankle.
Paris Saint-Germain, which had already seen Ballon d’Or winner Ousmane Dembélé come off hurt, reduced the deficit through substitute Joao Neves and Bayern endured some nervy moments before clinching yet another win.
Mac Allister’s winner
At Anfield, Madrid goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois produced save after save to defy Liverpool almost single-handedly but was finally beaten by Alexis Mac Allister’s header off a free kick in the 61st minute.
The teams had played each other in the league phase of last season’s competition at the same stadium, with Liverpool winning 2-0.
It took the brilliance of Courtois to keep the score down, with Kylian Mbappé kept quiet at the other end.
Alexander-Arnold, who left Liverpool for Madrid in the offseason, was jeered by the home fans before the game and after coming on as a second-half substitute.
Earlier, a mural dedicated to him near Anfield was defaced.
Arsenal’s record-setters
A fourth straight win. An eighth straight clean sheet to tie a 122-year record. A competition debut for 15-year-old schoolkid.
It was quite the night for Arsenal in Prague, where Bukayo Saka converted a penalty and Mikel Merino added two second-half goals.
Arsenal has yet to concede a goal in the Champion League and has matching its best-ever streak for shutouts, which was recorded in 1903 when in the second tier of English football. Dowman, aged 15 years and 308 days, entered as a second-half substitute for the Premier League leaders for his latest record-setting salvo.
Spalletti’s start
Juventus is still waiting for its first win of the league stage after coming from behind to draw 1-1 with Sporting Lisbon in Luciano Spalletti’s first Champions League game since taking over as coach.
The former Italy and Napoli coach watched the team’s poor start as Maximiliano Araújo fired in off the far post in the 12th minute. Francisco Trincão struck the crossbar just afterward, leaving Spalletti with his arms outstretched on the sideline.
Dusan Vlahovic equalized in the 34th.
Wins for Atletico, Monaco
Julian Alvarez, Conor Gallagher and Marcos Llorente scored a goal each as Atletico Madrid defeated Union Saint-Gilloise 3-1 at home.
It was a second win for Atletico, which was coming off a 4-0 defeat at Arsenal in the previous round.
Monaco also won, 1-0 at Bodø/Glimt thanks to US international Folarin Balogun’s first-half strike, for a first victory of the campaign.
Stalemate
Goals were expected but none arrived in a 0-0 draw between Napoli and visiting Eintracht Frankfurt.
Napoli was coming off a 6-2 loss to PSV Eindhoven two weeks ago but was without its most creative player in Kevin De Bruyne, who has just undergone surgery on his right hamstring.
It marked an end to Frankfurt’s remarkable run of 5-1 results in this season’s competition, with the German team having been on the receiving end of two of them.
In the night’s other match, US striker Ricardo Pepi scored in the third minute of stoppage time for PSV to salvage a 1-1 draw at Olympiakos. (AP)
