Wolfsburg stops Real Madrid with a 2-0 thrash
Germans Wolfsburg made good their threat of “annoying” Spaniards Real Madrid after seeing them off 2-0 in their first leg of the quarterfinals played at the Volkswagen Arena in Germany.
The win however included a questionable penalty awarded in the 18th minute after Casemiro was deemed to have fouled Andre Schurrle, allowing the hosts to take an early lead through Swaziland defender Ricard Rodriguez penalty.
Real Madrid defence looked unstable from the start and did not take long to snatch the second goal in the 25th minute through Maximilian Arnold with the largest share of blame going to Marcelo and Sergio Ramos, who allowed Arnold to side-foot the ball home from six yards.
Second half attempts by Real Madrid were not enough to guarantee them relief in the match as the Germans stood ground and refused to bulge.
In the Parc des Princes, two goals in either half were enough to assure Manchester City a bit of relief going into the return leg with Fernandinho setting up the first for De Bruyne to score in the 38th minute and netting the second in the 72nd.
Ibrahimovic who took advantage of sloppy PSG defending and Adrien Rabiot netted the PSG goals in the 41st and 59th minutes respectively.
Ibrahimovic would have stretched PSG’s win after having his penalty saved and hitting the bar in the match.
The respective return leg matches will be played on Tuesday 12 April in Spain and England respectively as the teams eye a place in the semis of the prestigious outing.
In the 1st quarter finals Luis Suarez was his team’s hero as he netted a brace in the second half to help Barcelona come from one goal behind and beat 10 man Athletico Madrid 2-1.
Fernando Torres opened the scoring in the 25th minute, but quickly went from hero to villain for Atletico when two reckless tackles saw him sent off in the 35th.
In another match, Arturo Vidal’s early goal gave five-time winners Bayern Munich victory over Benfica.
The midfielder headed home Juan Bernat’s cross from the left in the first attack of the game.