{"id":584,"date":"2025-01-31T22:17:41","date_gmt":"2025-01-31T14:17:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/?p=584"},"modified":"2025-01-31T22:17:41","modified_gmt":"2025-01-31T14:17:41","slug":"man-city-face-real-madrid-in-pick-of-champions-league-play-off-ties","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/31\/man-city-face-real-madrid-in-pick-of-champions-league-play-off-ties\/","title":{"rendered":"Man City face Real Madrid in pick of Champions League play-off ties"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1000\" height=\"665\" src=\"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/image-70.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-585\" srcset=\"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/image-70.png 1000w, https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/image-70-300x200.png 300w, https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/image-70-768x511.png 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Reigning champions Real Madrid will face 2023 winners Manchester City in the plum tie of the play-off round of this season&#8217;s Champions League, following Friday&#8217;s draw.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It is the fourth year running in which the sides have been drawn against each other in a knockout tie, with Real emerging victorious in a penalty shoot-out in the quarter-finals last season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>City, who scraped through after finishing 22nd in the league phase in this first season of the new format for Europe&#8217;s elite club competition, will be at home in the first leg before going to Spain for the return.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Elsewhere, Celtic will face six-time European champions Bayern Munich, after the Scottish champions reached the knockout stage for the first time in 12 years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Paris Saint-Germain will play surprise package Brest in an all-French tie, while Juventus play PSV Eindhoven and Feyenoord take on AC Milan in two ties between former winners of the competition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Last season&#8217;s Europa League winners Atalanta, who finished one place outside the top eight which offered a direct path to the last 16, will face Club Brugge of Belgium.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sporting of Portugal were drawn against last season&#8217;s runners-up Borussia Dortmund, while Monaco will take on Benfica having lost at home to the Portuguese club in the league phase.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The play-off ties will take place next month, with the eight winners going through to the last 16 along with the eight highest-placed sides from the league phase.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Liverpool, Barcelona, Arsenal, Inter Milan, Atletico Madrid, Bayer Leverkusen, Lille and Aston Villa are the sides already through to the last 16.<br><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Reigning champions Real Madrid will face 2023 winners M [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":585,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-584","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=584"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/584\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":586,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/584\/revisions\/586"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}