Matchday 3 of the UEFA Champions League was certainly a cracker! On Wednesday, Borussia Dortmund and RB Leipzig made it four victories in four for the Bundesliga representatives by beating Club Brugge and Paris Saint-Germain (3-0, 2-1 respectively). The Premier League had a mixed day, Chelsea comfortably beating Rennes 3-0 while Manchester United limped to a 2-1 defeat at Istanbul Basaksehir (their first in the CL proper!). Sevilla, meanwhile came from behind, with ten men, to beat Krasnodar 3-2. Oh, and Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo both won - Barcelona edging out Dynamo Kyiv 2-1, Juventus dismantling Ferencvaros 4-1.
Here are the best stats from Wednesday's action:
1
Basaksehir's Edin Visca is the first player to both score and assist in a single CL game against Manchester United since Arjen Robben for Bayern Munich in April 2014.
2
Sevilla are only the second Spanish side to win a game in the CL group stages after being two goals down. The first? Real Madrid in September 2009 vs Roma.
3
PSG have picked up only three points in their first three CL group stage games, the co-lowest total in their history in the competition (with 1997/98 and 2004/05). Those were the only two seasons in which they failed to emerge from the first group stage.
3
It has been a bad mid-week for French sides. This is the first time that the three Ligue 1 representatives (Marseille, Paris, Rennes) lost during the same week in the CL since October 2011 (Lille, Lyon, Marseille).
4
This is Erling Haaland's world and we are all just living in it. The wunderkind has now scored twice as many multi-goal games before turning 21 than any other player in Champions League history, with Wednesday his fourth. (Karim Benzema, Stevan Jovetic, Thierry Henry, Javier Saviola, Kylian Mbappe, and Nilmar are all second, on 2).
In fact, the only other player with even 3 multi-goal games in the CL before turning 22 is a certain Lionel Messi. A reminder, Haaland is 20, and has 4. Like we said, his world.
6
Edouard Mendy's 6 clean sheets in his first 7 games matches Petr Cech's total from his first 7 games for the club in 2004 (Note -- Cech also kept a clean sheet in his 8th game). In fact, in all competitions, this is the first time since October 2010 that Chelsea have kept five consecutive clean sheets. Also, they last started a Champions League campaign with three-straight clean sheets in 2009-10. Has Lampard found his Cech 2.0?
13
More Haaland gold! Ok, bronze, but still. The Norwegian has 13 goal contributions (7G, 6A) in all competitions this season, tied with Kylian Mbappe for the third most among players from Europe's top 5 leagues. Second is Harry Kane with 14 (6G, 8A). First, Robert Lewandowski with 16 (12G, 4A).
18
Manchester United's 18 game unbeaten away streak in all competitions has ended. This was their first away loss since Jan. 19, 2020 vs Liverpool. It had been the club's longest away-game unbeaten streak since 2010-11 (19).
38 (and 33)
For Barcelona, home continues to be where the heart is at. They have extended their record home-unbeaten streak in the CL to 38 games (dates back to Sept. 2013, 34 W, 4 D). They have also extended their home-unbeaten streak in the CL group stages to 33 games (29 W, 4D, last loss: 1-2 vs Rubin Kazan in Oct. 2009).
62
This was a matchday of goals. A lot of goals. 62 of them, in fact. This is the second highest number of goals scored in a single CL matchday since MD1 in 2000-01, when the participating clubs smashed in 63 goals between them.
100
Juventus are now the 5th club to win 100 CL matches, after Real Madrid (160), Barcelona (154), Bayern Munich (146) and Manchester United (120).
Messi-Ronaldo corner
Lionel Messi scored, Cristiano Ronaldo assisted, and their teams won. A good day in the office for the both of them, then.
4
Ronaldo has scored or assisted in each of his 4 appearances this season for Juve (5 goals, 2 assists).
4:53
Messi has scored his fastest penalty goal for Barcelona in all competitions and the fastest penalty goal by a Barcelona player in CL history, scoring the opener 4 mins 53 secs into the game.
5
Each of Messi's last 5 goals have been from the penalty spot (club and country). This is the first time ever that Messi has failed to score an open-play goal in his first 9 games of a season with Barcelona! How high can this number go?
11
On the other hand, it helps that he doesn't miss many penalties these days. Messi has converted each of his last 11 penalty kicks with Barcelona. He last failed to convert on Feb. 16, 2019.
15
This was Messi's 15th career Champions League penalty kick goal. That's second highest in league history. Guess who has the record? Cristiano Ronaldo, 17.
18
This was Ronaldo's 18th consecutive CL campaign - in the history of the competition, only Iker Casillas (20 in a row between 1999/00 and 2018/19) has appeared in more consecutively.
3983
A wonderfully obscure stat to sign off -- Messi's goal was his first against Dynamo Kiev since December 2009, with this being his longest gap between goals against the same opponent in the CL (3983 days).
(Stats courtesy ESPN's Stats & Information Group)