A Real awakening: Valverde treble stuns Manchester City

MADRID — Federico Valverde's superb first-half hat-trick helped Real Madrid demolish Manchester City 3-0 in a surprise Champions League last-16, first-leg rout on Wednesday.

Los Blancos were missing several key players, including Kylian Mbappe, but Uruguayan midfielder Valverde's stunning treble, netted inside a 22-minute spell, crushed Pep Guardiola's team at the Santiago Bernabeu.

Vinicius Junior missed a penalty in the second half, as Madrid could have built further on its significant lead ahead of the second leg in Manchester next Tuesday.

Even though Madrid is the record 15-time winner, its sketchy form offered little reason to believe it would deliver such a dominant result in what has become a modern Champions League classic.

City, which won the competition for the first and only time in 2023, beat Madrid in the league phase and has strengthened since then.

However, the Spanish giant produced its most convincing display of the season just when it mattered most to leave the Premier League visitor stunned.

"(It was) incredible, you dream of nights like this," Valverde told Movistar. "It's been a long time since I enjoyed a game like this. I'm really happy, but above all because the team won."

Madrid coach Alvaro Arbeloa, shorn of injured stars Mbappe, Jude Bellingham and Rodrygo, among several others, opted to start 18-year-old midfielder Thiago Pitarch after some recent bright displays.

Arbeloa said he was expecting a surprise or two from former Barca coach Guardiola, and the Catalan selected a particularly attacking lineup, seeking to capitalize on the frailties Madrid has exhibited this season.

Antoine Semenyo and Marc Guehi made their Champions League debuts and, for an all-too-brief period, City seemed to be settling in at the Bernabeu, before it unraveled.

"Now it feels really bad, now it feels really dark," City midfielder Bernardo Silva told TNT Sports.

"Tomorrow is another day and, for sure, next week we will go to the game thinking we have a chance."

Madrid took the lead against the run of play when goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois thumped a long ball down the pitch in Valverde's direction.

Nico O'Reilly misjudged it, and the Madrid midfielder blazed through on goal. City goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma came out to try and stop him, but Valverde nipped around him and rolled home in the 20th minute.

Seven minutes later, Madrid's captain struck again. Vinicius Junior fed the midfielder who coolly drilled past Donnarumma to double the host's lead.

Best for last

After a difficult first half of the season, consigned to mostly playing at right-back under Xabi Alonso, Arbeloa's arrival in January has unleashed Valverde.

The 27-year-old snatched a last-gasp winner at Celta Vigo in La Liga on March 6, and said that the victory had raised the team's morale.

It appeared he was grasping for optimism ahead of the City clash, in which most imagined Madrid to be underdogs, but Los Blancos played like a side who had found belief again.

Valverde completed a first career hat-trick before halftime with the best of his three strikes.

Valverde neatly flicked Brahim Diaz's pass over the helpless Guehi, before volleying home with aplomb as the Bernabeu crowd roared in delight. Finally, they saw a Madrid they recognized: dynamic and, above all, competitive.

Diaz nearly netted a fourth soon after halftime, but Donnarumma denied him, with City continuing to struggle after the interval.

Vinicius should have made it four, after the Italian goalkeeper brought him down in the box, but Donnarumma read the Brazilian's intentions and saved his low penalty.

Man City's top scorer Erling Haaland was kept quiet all night by Madrid centerbacks Antonio Rudiger and Dean Huijsen, with Guardiola replacing him on 83 minutes.

City's best chance to pull one back fell to O'Reilly as Pitarch's focus waned, but Courtois made a stunning reaction save with his leg to deny him and secure a precious clean sheet.

"The feelings we were getting from outside were of not much confidence in this team, (but) we showed we're Real Madrid and you can never count us out," a proud Arbeloa told Movistar.

Madrid defender Trent Alexander-Arnold said his team had surprised a lot of people who expected it to get "battered".

"(It was a) massive performance, I think a lot of the noise when the draw happened, and then leading up to this game, especially (given) the way that we've been playing the last few games, and the results we've had, a lot of people just expected us to get battered tonight," Alexander-Arnold told TNT Sports.

"It just shows the mentality. It doesn't matter what injuries you've got, what players are out, this competition means a lot to the club."

Neto apologizes

Chelsea winger Pedro Neto apologized for pushing a ball boy during Wednesday's 5-2 Champions League defeat to Paris Saint-Germain, an incident that contributed to a chaotic end to the visitor's late collapse.

The 26-year-old shoved the ball boy in stoppage time at the Parc des Princes, sending him into a chair and triggering a confrontation between players.

"I want to apologize to the ball boy," Neto told TNT Sports. "I have already spoken to him."

"We were losing, and, in the emotion of the game, I wanted to get the ball fast and I gave him a little push.

"I'm not like this. It was in the heat of the moment and I want to apologize. I gave him my shirt. I'm really sorry about it — I feel I have to apologize to him ... He could see what had happened and was happy with the situation."

Head coach Liam Rosenior also apologized for the incident.

"If there was anything from our side that was wrong or out of order, I apologize on behalf of the club," he said.

Luis Enrique's Paris side twice went ahead through Bradley Barcola and Ousmane Dembele, but was pegged back by goals from Malo Gusto and Enzo Fernandez, respectively, before Vitinha and Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, with a double, netted three late goals to put the host in control of the tie.

Agencies