Pep Guardiola names four teams who can win the Champions League

Pep Guardiola named four teams that can win the Champions League after Manchester City’s deflating exit. The struggling Premier League champions were blown away by Real Madrid in the Champions League play-offs, losing 3-1 at the Bernabeu on Wednesday night and 6-3 on aggregate across the two legs.

Man City had hope travelling to the Spanish capital despite losing 3-2 at the Etihad Stadium but Kylian Mbappe ended any talk of a comeback with a sensational hat-trick. His first goal came inside five minutes as he latched onto a hopeful long ball which should have been dealt with by the Manchester City defence before lobbing Ederson with a delicate finish.

Mbappe showed his brilliance by wrong-footed Josko Gvardiol and beating Ederson with his second before completing his 21st professional hat-trick after half-time. Man City scored a consolation goal in injury-time but this was still a humbling night for a team who won the Champions League less than two years ago.

Real Madrid flattered to deceive during the Champions League group phase and have not been at their scintillating best in La Liga, but this victory will convince many that the European trophy will be staying at the Bernabeu. Speaking after Manchester City’s European exit, Guardiola insisted Madrid were worthy ‘favourites’ in the Champions League but named three teams that could run Carlo Ancelotti’s side close.

‘Of course Madrid are a contender, definitely,’ Guardiola said. ‘But there are other good teams around. It will be an interesting Champions League season. ‘Madrid are always favourites for this trophy. There are other teams who are having a very good season but Madrid are always favourites.

‘But there are other teams that are playing very well. Liverpool are having a really good season up until now, Barcelona are amazing, Paris Saint-Germain, with my friend Luis [Enrique] in charge, are on the march. ‘But obviously, Madrid are favourites.’.

Discussing his team’s Champions League exit, Guardiola added: ‘The best team won. They deserved it. ‘This season we haven’t been so good – I felt that, in the previous seasons, we were better than Madrid, but this time not so. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video.

Up Next. ‘In this competition, quality always counts. This season Madrid are capable of long [spells of] possession; they were dynamic, they’re fast when they run and they pressed well. ‘What you have to do is accept it and move on. Nothing is eternal. It was hard to bring the 3-2 [first-leg defeat] here but now we have to learn from this and accept that there are another, I don’t know… 30 or 40 games to come [this season].

‘We have to try to win the FA Cup, we have to try to finish in the top four in the league and we have to try to be back again in this competition next season. ‘I have very little to reproach my squad for in terms of how they’ve played in the Champions League over the years. When we were eliminated by Madrid in the past, I felt we were very close.

‘We reached semi-finals and finals. Tonight, when a team is better sportingly than you, you have to accept it and congratulate them.’. Meanwhile, Ancelotti said his Real Madrid team produced a ‘complete performance’ to knock Man City out with ease and progress to the knockout stages of the Champions League.

‘This has been the complete performance – attack, defence, with the ball and without the ball, we showed such high levels of quality,’ he said. ‘We created so many goal chances. Almost the perfect night.’. For more stories like this, check our sport page.

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