Champions League Matchday 3 Started Off Bonkers

We’re only halfway through Matchday 3, but it already made heads explode with all the insanity. It’s Scanners for soccer heads.

Surely the Wednesday fixtures won’t be as nutball as the ones today. Lord knows we weren’t even close on today’s edition.

There were 43 goals scored across 9 games today. Given that one game ended in a 0 – 0 draw, that effectively means 43 goals were scored in 8 games. That 5.4 goals per game average is significantly higher than the 4.2 average from Sept. 19th.

We saw the fastest red card in Champions League history delivered today in the Kairat Almaty vs. Pafos match. João Correia earned it in the 4th minute after a high boot challenge that struck the face and chest of Kairat’s Luís Mata. It was an ugly challenge, deserving of a send off. And to be fair, was the only dramatic moment of an otherwise dull match.

There were also four other reds delivered, for a grand total of five on the day. That’s more than all the other previous matchdays combined!

I don’t think anyone outside the Gooner community figured Atlético Madrid would fold so easily. They only managed a single shot on goal, and that was late in the game after Arsenal had locked in the win. The big news from this one was Viktor Gyökeres finding his scoring boots. He put in the 3rd and 4th goals within four minutes, breaking a nine game drought.

Yes, this is the same PSV team who lost their opening match in this stadium to Union St.-Gilloise 3 – 1 and drew Bayer Leverkusen on the road. As for Napoli, before this game they had never conceded six goals in any European competition. A brace from Scott McTominay’s head couldn’t do anything to salvage this match for his side.

This game went off the rails early. Two red cards were issued between the 33rd and 37th minute, one to each team. Leverkusen’s captain Robert Andrich was caught throwing an elbow into Didier Doué’s face; PSG’s center back Illia Zabarnyi dragged Christian Kofane down in the box.

That’s when the game really opened up. Doué went on to score a brace, and six others contributed as well, including Willian Pancho. Pancho, who has played in 203 games in his career, scored his first ever goal. Ousmane Dembélé also played for the first time in over two months, scoring on his very first touch.

Gary Striker and I both predicted a big win for Barcelona over Olympiacos , and we were right. Fermin López hit two before halftime, and there was a brief moment where it looked like the Greek club could close the gap after Ayoub El Kaabi converted a penalty in the 57th minute. This came moments after Santiago Hezze was dismissed for (in my opinion) a bogus second yellow card.

But Barcelona would have none of that. Within a 13 minute period they smashed in four goals to put the game out of reach. The final score was 6 – 1.

I did predict a 2 – 2 draw for the Villareal vs. Manchester City fixture, mainly because Pep would over-think things. City did score two, but it doesn’t feel that half right is correct. You can see the prediction below.