Real Madrid face Dortmund, Arsenal face easy task in Champions League

Borussia Dortmund of Germany will be hosting Real Madrid of Spain, the title holder, today in a repeat of last season's Champions League final, in the third round of the Champions League, which will witness 8 other matches, most notably the match between Juventus of Italy and Stuttgart of Germany, Arsenal of England and Shakhtar Donetsk of Ukraine, and Aston Villa and Bologna of Italy.

At the Santiago Bernabéu in Madrid, Dortmund, who are suffering from inconsistent performances and constant criticism of coach Nuri Sahin, will have to show their best abilities against Real, who are looking for a new victory at their home stadium.

After being tipped to exit the group stage last year, Dortmund reached the final at Wembley in June, having improved significantly as the season progressed.

During the final, Dortmund dominated the first half and parts of the second half, but fell to Real Madrid's experience in big events, conceding two goals in the last quarter of an hour to lose 2-0.

Despite the continental achievement, coach Edin Terzic paid the price for the poor local season and was dismissed from his position after finishing fifth, with his assistant Sahin taking his place.

Shaheen, who started his career as a youth player in Dortmund, then had short stints as a player in Real Madrid and Liverpool, played ten matches in all competitions.

But he will now face his toughest test since taking charge, as the German team suffers from a lack of consistency and is still searching for a tactical identity.

After starting the season with a 2-0 win over Eintracht Frankfurt, Dortmund later suffered a humiliating 1-5 defeat to Stuttgart, and is currently in seventh place in the Bundesliga. What somewhat comforts its fans is that it tops the Champions League group, in which 36 teams are participating this season, after two wins over Club Brugge of Belgium and Celtic of Scotland.

Dortmund will be without several key attacking players, including Karim Adeyemi, Belgian Julian Duranville, American Giovanni Reyna and attacking Brazilian defender Yan Couto. Sahin criticised his team's defensive performance, saying: "It's a problem. It's not acceptable at all. We have to do better."

Sahin's comments came after Dortmund's hard-fought win over newly promoted St. Pauli thanks to a goal from Guinean Serhou Guirassy in the 83rd minute. "We conceded a similar goal against Celtic when we didn't defend well, and we also conceded another against Union Berlin, and now it's happened again," Sahin added.

Unfortunately for Dortmund, Real will be at their most focused on making up for their shock 1-0 defeat to Lille in the previous round. Real appear to have hit their peak form after a slow start to the season led by their new star, Frenchman Kylian Mbappe, who has scored in five of his last six league games.

Although Mbappé was not in last season's Champions League final, Dortmund have a lot of experience facing the Frenchman. They faced each other four times last season when Mbappé was a player for Paris Saint-Germain, and Dortmund managed to limit the threat of the French international striker, who scored only one goal, which came from a penalty kick.

After England international midfielder Jude Bellingham impressed in his first season with Real Madrid, scoring a lot of goals and helping his team win the double of the domestic league and the Champions League, his second season has not been convincing so far.

Bellingham, who joined Real in a huge deal worth $112 million, started last season by scoring 10 goals in 10 games in the domestic league and the Champions League, but after playing nine games this season in all competitions he has not scored a single goal. Bellingham will face his former club Dortmund in a repeat of the last continental final.

The 21-year-old has shown some frustration at the start of the season as coach Carlo Ancelotti has assigned him more defensive duties in midfield, especially after the arrival of Mbappe, and sometimes on the left side of midfield as happened in Saturday's 2-1 win over Celta Vigo, a new position for him.

The midfielder looked tired in the final months of the season, suffering from shoulder and ankle problems, and Bellingham was not at his best for England at Euro 2024 despite the Three Lions reaching the final, except for his wonderful scissor-kick goal against Slovakia in the last 16.

In 15 confrontations between Real Madrid and Dortmund in the prestigious continental competition, the Spanish royal team, which has won the title a record 15 times, won 7, drew 5, and Dortmund won 3.

After their impressive 2-0 win over Paris Saint-Germain, Arsenal are looking to continue their strong continental form against Shakhtar Donetsk. Arsenal are looking to make up for their domestic slump after the North London side suffered a shocking 2-0 defeat to Bournemouth in the eighth round of the English Premier League, which left them four points behind leaders Liverpool and three behind second-placed Manchester City.

Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has said the defeat to Bournemouth, the team's first domestic defeat of the season, will be a boost for the Gunners to respond strongly when they host Shakhtar Donetsk. Arsenal drew 0-0 in their first match against Atalanta before beating Paris Saint-Germain 2-0 to move 13th in the new Champions League standings with four points from two games.

“Let’s respond strongly after the local defeat,” Arteta said. “We have to move on and use the pain we had against Shakhtar. We suffered against Bournemouth because of Saliba’s sending off. We want to solve the red cards, it’s clear, we have to focus.” Shakhtar are yet to win in the Champions League after a goalless draw with Bologna and a 3-0 defeat by Italian side Atalanta.

Aston Villa appear to be a strong candidate to win against their guest, Bologna of Italy, especially after the English team succeeded in snatching a historic victory over the German giant Bayern Munich 1-0 in the second round.

Juventus are looking for a third win when they host Stuttgart. Armed with a 1-0 win over Lazio in the local league, the "Old Lady" team hopes to continue its good start in the continental competition, while Stuttgart, the runner-up in the "Bundesliga" last season, hopes to shake off the dust of the heavy loss to Bayern Munich 0-4 on Saturday in the league.

AC Milan are looking to secure their first win after two defeats when they host Club Brugge of Belgium. Milan, who have won the continental title seven times, started the competition with two losses, the last of which was at the home of German champion Bayer Leverkusen 1-0.

Despite the loss, new Portuguese coach Paulo Fonseca said the team came out with several positives, saying: “This is the game I liked the most since I arrived. In the second half, we played a great game. We created a lot of chances but couldn’t score. We feel sad and disappointed with the result, but I’m satisfied with our performance.”

Paris Saint-Germain seeks to return to the winning track on the continental level after losing to Arsenal in the previous round when they play at their home stadium, Parc des Princes, a match that seems within their reach against Dutch side PSV Eindhoven, as the visiting team's fans will be absent to avoid riots.

"We knew it would be a tough game, with a lot of pressure from the opposition. We failed to deal with that pressure, but we are learning and we will make up for it in the next games," said PSG coach Luis Enrique after the recent defeat to Arsenal.

In the rest of today's matches, Monaco of France meets Crvena Zvezda of Serbia, Sturm Graz of Austria meets Sporting Lisbon of Portugal, and Girona of Spain meets Slovan Bratislava of Slovakia. Dortmund is struggling domestically but is making steady progress continentally and is looking to avenge the loss in the previous final to Real Madrid.