Man City rally to advance in Champions League - EPL champions beat Club Brugge 3-1; PSG also win to stay in competition

GENEVA, Switzerland:

Manchester City stayed in the European Champions League, barely. Paris Saint-Germain saved their elite status in style.

Both avoided embarrassing exits with crucial wins yesterday, grateful to be among the 24 teams in the knockout stage.

In the new playoffs-round draw on Friday they will also find defending champions Real Madrid and Bayern Munich who surprisingly finished in mid-table after the 36-team standings was finalised.

Man City flirted with a disaster before rallying to beat Club Brugge 3-1 in a must-win game. Trailing 1-0 at halftime, and then sitting 26th in the live standings, the 2023 title winners were sparked by substitute Savinho to avoid elimination.

City finished 22nd, but relief turns to the realisation that their playoff round opponents will be either Madrid or Bayern.

PSG started play in 22nd before cruising to a 4-1 win at Stuttgart that eliminated the German club.

The French champions impressed again after a crucial 4-2 comeback win over Man City one week ago, and rose to 15th place. Still, that puts PSG on a path to meet either Liverpool or Barcelona in the round of 16 in March if they win an all-French playoff against either Monaco or Brest.

LIVERPOOL ON TOP

Liverpool topped the standings despite a 3-2 loss with a weakened team at PSV Eindhoven, and Barcelona ended runners-up after a 2-2 draw with Atalanta.

Only the top eight teams go direct to the round of 16 and defending champions Madrid finished 11th and Bayern 12th even after wins yesterday. Madrid won 3-0 at Brest and Bayern beat Slovan Bratislava 3-1.

Inter Milan, Arsenal and Atletico Madrid sealed top-eight finishes as expected with low-key wins. Inter beat Monaco 3-0, Arsenal won 2-1 at Girona and Atletico won 4-1 at Salzburg, which had a woeful campaign.

Bayer Leverkusen, Lille -- which thrashed Feyenoord 6-1 -- and Aston Villa completed the top eight.

Stuttgart dropped to 26th place and were eliminated along with Dinamo Zagreb, despite their 2-1 win over AC Milan. Brugge took the 24th qualification place ahead of Dinamo on the tiebreaker of goal difference.

NO SHOCK EXITS

An unprecedented Champions League night of 18 games playing at the same time -- completing the new 144-game opening phase format - ended with no shock exits though final standings that defied expectations.

Three English teams finished in the top eight but not Man City.

Two Spanish teams finished in the top eight but not Real Madrid.

The one German team in the top eight is not Bayern, and the one French team is not PSG.

Those four wealthy powers of European soccer found the new format trickier than expected. They now have the burden of two extra games on back-to-back midweeks in February to earn round-of-16 places that were routine in the old group-stage format.

Villa joined Liverpool and Arsenal in the top eight by beating Celtic 4-2 to rise to 16 points -- the cut that meant avoiding the playoffs.

UEFA's preseason prediction of eight points to enter the knockout phase proved far off the mark.

Dinamo got 11 points and still were eliminated, ensuring no team from eastern Europe will be in the knockout phase.

The lowest-ranked country in Friday's playoffs round draw is Scotland, whose champions Celtic finished 21st, one place and one point above Man City.

- AP