Real Madrid\u2019s Champions League journey for the 2024\/25 campaign will see them cross paths with a very familiar opponent: Manchester City. Thursday\u2019s group-stage draw confirmed yet another showdown between the two European giants, marking the fifth consecutive season the clubs will meet in the competition.<\/p>\n
Speaking ahead of City\u2019s Premier League clash with Brighton, Pep Guardiola reflected on the draw:<\/p>\n
\u201cFace Real Madrid? It is an honour to be the rival manager with the most games played at the Bernab\u00e9u. Nice to be back in Spain.\u201d \u2014 Pep Guardiola<\/p>\n
The Spanish coach has now managed at the Santiago Bernab\u00e9u 25 times in his career, leaving with 13 victories. His record against Los Blancos, however, has been mixed depending on the team he was leading. With Manchester City, his lone win in Madrid came during the 2019\/20 Round of 16, when the Premier League side secured a 2\u20131 first-leg triumph.<\/p>\n
Since then, Real Madrid have often had the upper hand. Guardiola\u2019s City were famously knocked out in the 2022 semi-finals after Madrid\u2019s miraculous remontada at the Bernab\u00e9u. In 2023, the two sides played out a 1\u20131 draw in Spain before City dominated the return leg with a 4\u20130 win at the Etihad. Then, Madrid once again delivered heartbreak: a 3\u20133 draw at the Bernab\u00e9u was followed by a statement penalty shootout win in Manchester, and last season Kylian Mbapp\u00e9\u2019s hat-trick sealed a 3\u20131 victory in the return leg of the Champions League playoffs.<\/p>\n
Real Madrid\u2019s ability to consistently challenge Guardiola, both with Bayern Munich and City, has made them something of a recurring obstacle in his pursuit of his European glory. The 2014 semi-final, when Ancelotti\u2019s Madrid demolished Bayern 0\u20134 at the Allianz Arena, still stands as one of the defining defeats of Guardiola\u2019s career.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Real Madrid\u2019s Champions League journey for the 2024\/25 campaign will see them cross paths with a very familiar…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":107127,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[49,48,61019,561,82],"class_list":["post-107126","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-real-madrid-cf-champions-league","tag-soccer","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107126","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107126"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107126\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/107127"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}