Jose Antonio Pascual
Madrid, Nov 5 (EFE) .- Having reached the halfway point of the 2020/21 Champions League, the trio of great favorites, Bayern Munich, Liverpool and Manchester City, exhibited their stripes at the same time that Barcelona also completed the plenary session, although with any questions.
Bayern, current champions, are still in roller mode. He commands with an iron fist and authoritatively Group A, in which he has beaten Atlético de Madrid (4-0), has beaten Lokomotiv (1-2) more closely in Moscow and has overwhelmed in the last stage to Salzburg (2-6).
Hansi Flick's team maintains its spectacular winning streak in a row and has confirmed its status as number one contender to revalidate the title it won in Lisbon. He is the one who has scored the most goals to date, with twelve.
Liverpool, champions two years ago, have not only won their three games, but have also done so without conceding a goal. His triumphs against Ajax (0-1), Midtjylland (2-0) and Atalanta (5-0) catapulted him back to the shortlist of favorites, ready to forget last year's setback at Anfield against Atlético de Madrid.
The German coach Jurgen Klopp also has another jewel in the offensive facet, the Portuguese Diogo Jota, who achieved a hat-trick in Bergamo.
Meanwhile, Pep Guardiola's City sails with solvency within Group C after beating Porto (3-1), Marseille (0-3) and Olympiacos (3-0).
The Catalan coach, the young Spanish Ferrán Torres, also offers his 'surprise' player, one of the incorporations of this season, who is standing out at the top, so much so that he has scored in all three games.
Barcelona is the fourth team that counts its games by victories. He beat the modest Ferencvaros (5-1), hit the table in Group G by beating Juventus without Cristiano Ronaldo (0-2) in Turin and suffered a lot to get rid of the diminished Dinamo Kiev (2-1) , thanks in large part to the saves of the German goalkeeper Marc André Ter Stegen, who reappeared after several months.
However, at this stage, the Dutch Ronald Koeman's side is showing its superiority. It is the team that has made the most shots (57) and also leads the table of shots on goal (29), a facet in which the Argentine Leo Messi is the leader with nine, one more than the Colombian Duván Zapata and the Norwegian Erling Braut Haaland.
Chelsea is, along with Liverpool, the other team that remains unbeaten, although in their case they have not allowed them to win their three games, since in the first one Sevilla took a valuable 0-0 from Stamford Bridge.
Frank Lampard's side and Julen Lopetegui's side will play for first place in Group E after both beat Krasnodar and Rennes later. These, however, have raised a battle, as on this third day the Russian team at Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán, where they came to dominate 0-2, although the reaction of the Spanish team allowed them to get an essential victory 3-2 in that fight for the pass and the lead.
Atlético de Madrid should assert its superiority against Lokomotiv and Salzburg to confirm itself as Bayern's shooting guard. The tie in Moscow was a football accident in view of the game played by the Argentine Diego Pablo Simeone team and should not diminish their options one iota.
The king of the competition, Real Madrid, is having a tortuous path, although the hasty victory over Inter (3-2) on matchday three, forged in an action by the young Brazilian duo Vini Jr-Rodrygo, gives it air .
Zinedine Zidane's side, who started with a defeat in Madrid against Shakhtar Donetsk and drew a draw in Mönchengladbach, were practically on the canvas. However, the visit to San Siro is once again decisive before playing in Ukraine against the disconcerting and irregular Shakhtar and receiving Borussia, who leads the group with five points, on the last day.
In an even more complicated situation is the current runner-up, Paris Saint Germain, weighed down by the defeats in the Parc des Princes against Manchester United (1-2) and in the fiefdom of Leipzig (2-1), which took the rematch of the last semifinal and took advantage of the numerous and important casualties of the German side Thomas Tuchel, among them Kylian Mbappe and Neymar.
His group, however, is quite open after United unexpectedly succumbed to Istanbul Basaksehir (2-1), a rookie in the tournament who had not managed to score or score until Wednesday.
Borussia Dortmund lead group F after recovering from the initial defeat at the Olympic in Rome against Lazio (3-1). The triumphs against Zenit Saint Petersburg (2-0) and Brugge (0-3), together with the equalizer of the Italian team, put them at the head of the series with a point advantage.
Haaland's state of grace, who has also scored in the three rounds, put Dortmund back on the ramp of the round of 16 although a mistake would complicate his life a lot.
The Nordic tops the table of gunners with four goals, tied with Diogo Jota, Marcus Rashford (protected in his triplet against Leipzig) and the Spanish Álvaro Morata with his doublets in Kiev and Budapest.
The Polish Robert Lewandowski, the best player and top scorer last season, has been slow to find his way to the goal, but on this last day he has already started with a double.
The Champions League will resume on November 24 again to the sprint, with the remaining three days in three consecutive weeks, and as before with the coronavirus as an added and unavoidable factor before the casualties that do not stop happening in most of equipment. EFE