Haaland ends goal drought as City squeeze into last 16

The days when Pep Guardiola’s rivalry with Jose Mourinho was toxic are long gone. They may never clash again. But for a few minutes, they were linked again.

- RICHARD JOLLY AT THE ETIHAD STADIUM

A grateful Guardiola, who cursed his old enemy in the past, said he would send the Portuguese a message to thank him. It was Mourinho’s Benfica who spared Manchester City a return ticket to the Champions League’s knockout playoffs. Some of the cheers at the Etihad Stadium came long after the City players had left the pitch. They greeted Benfica’s fourth goal against Real Madrid; scored, improbably, by goalkeeper Antoliy Trubin. The 15-time European champions were down to nine men, condemned to ninth place by defeat.

The manner of it bemused the City team, by then watching in the dressing room, waiting as their fate was determined. “We didn’t know Benfica needed a goal to qualify so when the goalkeeper goes up, we say, ‘why you go?’ because Madrid can equalise and we are out,” smiled Guardiola. “But it was a good strategy for Jose." And a good outcome for Guardiola.

City had kicked off in 11th and climbed as high as fifth at one stage in the night. They eventually clung on to eighth. They may yet rue not finishing higher, and the points they dropped in the north of Norway. Theirs could be the toughest of last-16 ties. They at least take the direct route there, albeit in an unorthodox way: victorious in the Bernabeu and losing in the Arctic Circle. But beating Real ultimately had more significance than being beaten by Bodo/Glimt.