It’s a familiar scenario for Paris Saint-Germain: on a quest for European dominance and validation as one of the world’s top clubs, but Barcelona stand in their way. Barca eliminated PSG at the quarterfinal stage of both the 2012-13 and 2014-15 Champions League.
On February 22nd and March 14th, two titans of the goalkeeping position will clash in their final duel at the highest level of the game. Perhaps we shouldn’t ever write-off the possibility of the 35-year-old Iker Casillas and the 39-year-old Gianluigi Buffon encountering each other on the pitch again, but we should be exceptionally grateful for at least one last bout.
There’s no escaping the fact that the draws for the Champions League and the Europa League are ridiculous. These hugely overdone gala affairs take three hours to achieve what could be done in ten minutes. The saving graces - scowling club directors, getting to see Clarence Seedorf again - are vastly overshadowed by the ludicrous complexity of everything and UEFA’s willingness to blow their own trumpet at every conceivable opportunity. The entire event is comical, but it doesn’t really matter.
The 2016-17 UEFA Champions League Round of 16 draw took place early Monday morning in Nyon, Switzerland and left us with some very entertaining match ups:
It was over eight years ago on a cold night in Moscow that Manchester United defied the odds to defeat Chelsea and win the UEFA Champions League, their first victory in the competition since 1999. It was a monumental achievement from the Red Devils, and, to this day, it remains the club's last great European triumph.
Eight years on, it's interesting to take a look at what the 14 players who appeared on the night are up to now.
We thought this year might be different. How wrong we were. We thought this might be the year that Arsenal finally catch a break in the Champions League round of 16 and push through to the quarterfinals, ending a six-year round of 16 losing streak. We thought "surely they won't draw Bayern Munich again, that would be too cruel even for the soccer gods".
Arsenal drew Bayern Munich again.
The 2016-17 Champions League Group Stage has finished with all the usual contenders set to battle it out in the round of 16. Monday’s draw has handed us the following match ups: