Key events
There’s a spectacular atmosphere in San Siro. It sounds like the build-up to a semi-final second leg, not the first European game of the season.
Amadou Onana has put Villa 3-0 up in Switzerland. All things being equal, they are going to be really good fun to watch in this competition.
Plenty of other big clubs are in action tonight, including Real Madrid, Bayern Munich and Manchester United. You can follow their games, and more, with Taha Hashim.
“Traditional powerhouse AC Milan has exactly zero Italian attacking players in the starting XI?!” says Peter Oh. “What does that say about the state of Italian football?”
You’ve seen Liverpool’s front six, right? And England won Euro 2024!
The pre-match thoughts of Arne Slot
It’s a special occasion because Liverpool weren’t in the Champions League last season so we’re looking forward to being in it.
[On the changes] It is managing minutes, and we have more than 11 good playters. Today it’s Kostas and Cody. It’s all about them doing what they have to do for the team, and hopefully as a result of that we’ll get the best individual performance out of them as well.
Liverpool missed out on the Champions League last season, so this is their first game since a trip to Madrid in March 2023. Virgil van Dijk is glad to be back.
Alisson isn’t quite so full of the joys.
Half time: Young Boys 0-2 Aston Villa
Juventus v PSV is one of two games that have just reached half-time. Aston Villa, playing their first European Cup march since March 1983, are 2-0 up away to Young Boys thanks to Youri Tielemans and Jacob Ramsey. Ollie Watkins had a third goal VARed just before half-time.
You can follow that game with our resident MBM genius Scott Murray.
Team news: Tsimikas and Gakpo start
Arne Slot makes a couple of changes from Liverpool’s defeat to Forest. In: Kostas Tsimikas and Cody Gakpo. Out: Andy Robertson and Luis Diaz.
Milan make three changes, bringing in Davide Calabria, Fikayo Tomori and Alvaro Morata for Emerson Royal, Matteo Gabbia and Tammy Abraham. Despite his absence there are four ex-Chelsea players in the starting XI.
How the Swiss Model works
This is the short version.
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36 teams each play eight games between now and the end of January.
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The top eight go through to the last 16.
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The bottom 12 go home (not to the Europa League, not even with their bus fare).
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The teams that finish 9th to 24th play off for a place in the last 16.
Confused? Of course you are. Now all I need are the last three digits on the back of the card.
The answer to a popular quiz question of the future is Kenin Yildiz. He scored the opening goal of the Champions League’s Swiss Model era for Juventus against PSV Eindhoven. It was a fine goal, or, in the parlanace of our time, CAPITAL LETTERS GOOD. Weston McKennie has since made it 2-0.
Preamble
And now for $omething €ompl£t£ly diff£r£nt: the beginning of the Champions League’s Swiss Model era. Think of it as men’s football’s answer to Brat summer, only with less hedonism, loads more anxiety, billions of pounds being trousered by suits and a mysterious spate of soft-tissue injuries.
So far it’s going well, with one of the best players in the world marking the big day by confirming he and his peers have had their fill of games being added to the calendar.
Whatever you think of the new format – I can see both sides! – it will still end with Real Madrid one lucky team enjoying the greatest high in club football. The magic of becoming European champions will never fade. AC Milan and Liverpool, who meet tonight, have done so seven and six times respectively, with only Real Madrid winning the competition more often.
Both clubs are European Cup royalty. Alas, if we’re talking royalty, in recent times Milan have been more like [redacted]. They haven’t reached the final since beating Liverpool 2-1 in Athens in 2007. In fact they’ve only reached the semi-final once in the last 17 years, and even that memory must stay in a sealed box: after fighting their way past Spurs and Napoli in 2022-23, they were hammered by Internazionale in the last four.
Liverpool have reached the final in three of their last six Champions League campaigns and have begun the season well under Arne Slot, even if they ran head first into a tree against Nottingham Forest on Saturday. Milan are 10th in Serie A after a mixed start under Paulo Fonseca, but they are joint top-scorers and hammered Venezia 4-0 at the weekend.
I’d love to say this is a must-win game for both sides, but I don’t want to lie to you. Not yet. We may eventually reflect that the result of tonight’s game was decisive; right now it feels less about jeopardy and more about novelty.
Kick off 8pm.
