IFFHS CONTINENTAL NEWS - UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE
Picture : Jamal Musiala and FC Bayern broke records !
Statistics on Champions’ League group stage round 3 (October 24)
*Sevilla’s home 1-2 loss to Arsenal is the first defeat for a Spanish club in the current Champions League edition, after 12 unbeaten games (8 wins and 4 draws).
*Sevilla, triumphant in Europe League (9 wins and 1 draw in last 10 home games there), are much less impressive in Champions League (where they have only won 2 of their last 10 home games).
*Gabriel Martinelli (Arsenal) has now scored on his first start for Arsenal in the Champions League (vs Sevilla), as well as he has already done on his first start in all other competitions: Europa League (vs Standard Liège), Premier League (vs West Ham) and League Cup (vs Nottingham Forest).
*Union Berlin (0-1 vs Napoli) is the 7th German club to start a Champions League group stage with 3 consecutive defeats, after Schalke (2001), Bayer Leverkusen (2002, 2019), Hamburg (2006), Stuttgart (2007) and RB Leipzig (2021).
*Real Madrid (2-1 vs Braga) have won all their first 3 games of a Champions League group stage for the 9th time (not counting the second group stage), but for the first time all 3 their starting wins of a campaign are minimal (also 1-0 vs Union Berlin and 3-2 vs Napoli).
*Braga is the team that has played the most Champions League games (15) without ever drawing (5 wins and 10 losses).
Only one other team did not tie any of their first 15+ games in UCL: Malmö (the first draw in their 17th game).
*Jude Bellingham became only 2nd player to score in each of his first three games in Champions League (since 1992) for Real Madrid,
after Christian Karembeu in 1998.
In the previous era of European Cup (since 1955), other 5 players managed to do it: Joseíto in 1956, Tejada in 1961, Grosso in 1964, Grande in 1969, Juanito in 1978.
*It was 200th game for Real Madrid’s coach Carlo Ancelotti in UCL. He is the third coach in the history of competition to reach this figure, after Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger.
*Ancelotti equaled Alex Ferguson as the coach with the most wins (115 for each) in the UCL history.
*Brais Méndez (Real Sociedad) who scored the winning goal vs Benfica (1-0), is just the 2nd Spanish player to score in his first three UCL games (also vs Inter and vs Salzburg), after José Mari with Milan in 2000 (vs Barcelona, vs Besiktas and vs Galatasaray).
*Alexis Sánchez (Inter) who scored the opener vs Salzburg (2-1), has now 16 goals in UCL. He has surpassed Arturo Vidal (15) as the Chilean player with the most goals in the history of Champions League.
The next are far behind: Ivan Zamorano and Marcelo Salas with 5 goals each.
*Galatasaray (1-3 vs Bayern) have broken their unbeaten series of 23 games in all competitions (20 wins, 3 draws). They were last defeated almost 6 months ago, in the national league game vs Besiktas (1-3) on 30 April 2023.
*Bayern carry on their 3 record series in Champions’ League group stages and have just established the 4th:
16 consecutive victories (no other club managed to make more than 10),
37 games in a row without losing (34 wins, 3 draws, no other club managed to make more than 30),
19 consecutive unbeaten games away (the previous record was 17).
8 consecutive wins away (they just surpassed Juventus with 7 between 2019 and 2021).