The UEFA Champions League group stage is over and we finally know the 16 teams that will compete in the round of 16. Two countries are well represented with all their teams involved qualifying for the next round: Germany (three teams) and England (four teams). They are the only countries to have achieved such a feat.
With Chelsea, Manchester United and Manchester City qualified, English fans were counting on Arsenal to do the same. And Arsenal needed to lose by three or more goals to Napoli to be knockout, so the task was not so hard.
At Napoli, the Gunners dominated the game, having the possession most of the time. However, Napoli had the best opportunities to score with Higuain, Armero or Callejon. It is finally Higuain who put Napoli ahead at the 73rd minute. At that time Napoli was qualified as Marseille and Dortmund were tied at 1-1. And everything seemed to go the Italians' way after Mikel Arteta was sent off for a well-deserved second yellow card. Callejon scored the second goal for Napoli at the 90th minute and Arsenal was visibly shaken in the extra time, but Napoli never managed to score this third goal.
A third goal that would have been vain since Dortmund defeated Marseille, 2-1, and clutch the first place of the Group F. Arsenal finishes second, Napoli will play Europa League and Marseille, the only team out of the 32 with zero point, finishes last!
Shalke 04 joins Dortmund, Leverkusen and Bayern Munich in the round of 16, making it four for four for the Germans. Shalke defeated Basel, 2-0, and earned the second place of Group E behind Chelsea.
In Group G, Athletico Madrid dominated Porto, 2-0, and sits comfortably at the top. Zenith St. Petersburg, despite a huge loss, 1-4, to Austria Vienna finishes second. Porto is third and Vienna gets fourth place.
Finally, in Group H, AC Milan is the only Italian teams to survive group stage after drawing, 0-0, with Ajax. Barcelona ensured the first place of the group by destroying Celtic, 6-1, with a hat-trick by Neymar. Ajax will play the Europa League and Celtic is out of all competitions.
Early today, Galatasaray defeated Juventus with a late goal from Wesley Sneijder (85') in a game played in two-days (30 minutes yesterday and one hour today) due to bad weather. Galatasaray takes second place of Group B behind Madrid. Juventus is third.
Here are the list of the teams that qualified for next round:
England: Chelsea, Manchester United, Manchester City and Arsenal (4/4)
Spain: Real Madrid, Barcelona and Athletico Madrid (3/4)
France: PSG (1/2)
Germany: Bayern Munich, Bayer Leverkusen, Dortmund, Shalke04 (4/4)
Italy: AC Milan (1/3)
Russia: Zenith St Petersburg (1/2)
Greece: Olympiakos (1/1)
Turkey: Galatasaray (1/1)
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