Al Hilal stuns City in extra-time thriller

Guardiola swapped out Haaland for Egyptian forward Omar Marmoush as the game moved into extra time.

But, for all City's depth of personnel, Al Hilal had a deeper well of spirit to draw upon, and just four minutes into the opening period it regained the lead when Kalidou Koulibaly rose superbly to meet a Ruben Neves corner with a brilliantly angled header.

City responded with a goal of real quality, when, following Rodri's departure and Phil Foden's introduction, Rayan Cherki's brilliantly floated ball towards the back post was poked home masterfully by Foden, at full stretch and from the tightest of angles.

Yet, incredibly, the Blue Waves were not finished — Sergej Milinkovic-Savic's header was saved by Ederson, but Leonardo followed up to bundle the ball over the line from a prone position.

As the celebrating Al Hilal fans poured out of the stadium, the Brazilian striker let his emotions pour out.

"I've had a difficult time in the last two months. My mother spent 70 days in the ICU," he said.

"Today, she's fine, thank God. When I scored those two goals, I thought of her. She was able to watch the match".

City skipper Silva said his team had paid the price for being unable to deal with Al Hilal's counterattack.

"We scored three and could've scored five, six. It was all about controlling when we lost the ball, controlling the transitions, not letting them run, and they ran way too many times," he said.

"With one, two passes there was always a feeling of danger coming from them. When we allow teams to run like this, we always suffer a lot, as was the case today."

Agencies