Defeat to Manchester City!

RB Leizpig were beaten 3-1 at home by Manchester City on matchday 2 of the Champions League group stage. This defeat marks the end of our side’s seven-game unbeaten run in all competitions and is our first ever loss at home to the Cityzens.

Pep Guardiola’s team quickly got their passing game going, although the home team kept things tight at the back in the early exchanges. The first dangerous moment came in the 14th minute when Phil Foden’s shot went wide from Rico Lewis’ ball in. City ramped up the pressure and the majority of the first half was played in the Leipzig half. This resulted in the reigning Champions League winners going ahead after 25 minutes. Lewis put the ball into the box and Foden found the back of the net for 1-0. Erling Haaland had his first opportunity in the 42nd minute, only to be denied from a tight angle by Janis Blaswich. Lois Openda had the final chance of the first half, winning a corner with his effort.

The second half began brilliantly for RBL! Yussuf Poulsen played the ball into some space for Openda, he was quicker than Manuel Akanji and then remained calm in front of goal to equalise! (48’) This goal gave the hosts a boost and saw us win more tackles and have more of the ball. In response though, City stepped things up and put together several good attacks. Haaland couldn’t connect with a ball to the back post (57’) and Blaswich tipped a Foden free-kick onto the bar (63’). Despite a passionate performance from RBL, they could do nothing about Julian Alvarez’s curling effort with six minutes left of regular time. Christoph Baumgartner fired just over late on, but Jeremy Doku sealed the win for last season’s treble winners in injury time.