Tomorrow, the UEFA Champions League will drop from 24 to 16, as the losing eight squads will be faced with elimination and the winning eight squads will go on to face the top eight teams from the League Phase of the competition. After the first legs, some of the fixtures are close, while one team blew it wide open last week.
DraftKings Sportsbook has plenty of bets available every week for the UCL, and the Playoff Round is no exception. Here are my top picks over the next two weeks:
First, let’s take a look at the full list of fixtures, with the Feyenoord-AC Milan tie already underway:
Feyenoord at AC Milan, 12:45 p.m. ET, February 18 (Feyenoord 1-0 on aggregate)
Club Brugge at Atalanta, 3 p.m. ET, February 18 (Club Brugge 2-1 on aggregate)
Celtic at Bayern Munich, 3 p.m. ET, February 18 (Bayern Munich 2-1 on aggregate)
AS Monaco at Benfica, 3 p.m. ET, February 18 (Benfica 1-0 on aggregate)
Sporting CP at Borussia Dortmund, 12:45 p.m. ET, February 19 (Borussia Dortmund 3-0 on aggregate)
Brest at Paris Saint-Germain, 3 p.m. ET, February 19 (Paris Saint-Germain 3-0 on aggregate)
Juventus at PSV Eindhoven, 3 p.m. ET, February 19 (Juventus 2-1 on aggregate)
Manchester City at Real Madrid, 3 p.m. ET, February 19 (Real Madrid 3-2 on aggregate)
Ademola Lookman Anytime Goal Scorer (+135)
Lookman — Atalanta’s hat-trick hero who scored all three goals in last season’s Europa League final to end Bayer Leverkusen’s hopes of an undefeated, treble-winning season — might not even be the best forward on the roster anymore. That honor, instead, goes to Italian Mateo Retegui, who has smashed home 25 goals in all competitions, including 20 in the Serie A to become that competition’s leading goalscorer. Retegui did not score during the first leg, though, and has just three goals in the Champions League so far. Lookman has four goals, but he’s scored in four of the six Champions League matches in which he has appeared.
Although Lookman has not played since January 25 while dealing with some knee issues, he is expected to make his return tonight for an Atalanta squad that desperately needs his shot-creating abilities while in a 2-1 hole. I’d expect him to draw the start if he’s fully fit; in the League Phase, he started the Nerazzurri’s matches against Real Madrid, Arsenal, and Stuttgart — the three toughest matchups that the team faced prior to Lookman’s injury — and he played nearly the full 90 minutes against all of them, netting against Stuttgart and the Galacticos.
Atalanta looked pretty rough in the first game, losing the expected goal battle, 1.4-1.0, and conceding a late penalty that sealed its defeat. Retegui and Charles De Ketelaere fired just one shot each, with De Ketelaere’s long-distance effort being saved and Retegui missing in the 40th minute. If nothing else, Lookman will at least shoot; he’s gotten off at least two shots in seven of his last 10 matches across all competitions, including eight against Real Madrid. Simon Mignolet has just a 62.1% save percentage in the Champions League this season, so if Lookman can sneak past the Brugge defense, he should have no trouble getting one past the veteran shot-stopper.
Celtic +2.25 (-135)
I think these lines are pretty disrespectful to the Scottish giants, who are once again running away with the Premiership with 69 points in just 26 matches. They picked up 12 points during the League Phase — just three fewer than Bayern Munich — and produced by far the better chances during the teams’ first-leg fixture (1.3 xG-0.7 xG), even though the Bavarians were starting a mostly full-strength starting eleven. At only slightly negative odds to lose by two or fewer goals, I think it’s a no-brainer. In this case, if Bayern wins by two, Celtic +2.25 bettors would win half of their original stake, since their bet would be effectively split into Celtic +2 (push) and Celtic +2.5 (winning) bets.
I’m confident in Celtic, who haven’t lost a match by two or more goals since a 7-1 thrashing at the hands of Borussia Dortmund on October 1. Sure, Bayern is a better team than Dortmund, who are just 11th in the Bundesliga, but since the latter has been absolutely on fire in the Champions League, I don’t think it’s fair to expect the Bavarians to match their counterparts’ performance.
During the first leg, Celtic fired off each of the last eight shots of the game after Bayern shifted to a more defensive formation. With a one-goal lead, Vincent Kompany will likely play more conservatively in the early going, which should allow Celtic to get enough shots off to avoid a lopsided scoreline.
Benfica-AS Monaco U4.5 Total Bookings (+100)
The first leg between these two sides was an extremely scrappy affair, with the Lisbon giants eventually coming out on top behind a Vangelis Pavlidis goal in the 48th minute. Benfica — which fired 23 total shots, including 15 after Monaco defensive midfielder Almoatasem Al Musrati was sent off after receiving his second yellow card — was unlucky not to come away with a bigger margin entering the second leg, as they produced 2.1 expected goals to Monaco’s 0.4. In total, this game saw six different bookings.
All three of the players who received yellows for Monaco — Al Musrati, Vanderson, and Denis Zakaria — have been suspended after accruing three yellow cards in Champions League competition, so the French side is going to be concerned about losing more players to suspension and might play somewhat conservatively to ensure that it doesn’t lose any more players for a potential Round of 16 tie. For Benfica, Álvaro Carreras’ yellow was his fourth of the competition, so he’ll be suspended if he picks up another yellow, and the Eagles will also be without Florentino Luís, who accrued his third yellow.
Nicolás Otamendi, Orkun Kökçü, and Fredrik Aursnes are regular starters who are all on two yellow cards in the competition for Benfica, and for Monaco, Thilo Kehrer, Lamine Camara, and Wilfried Singo are the most at risk of suspension.
Sporting CP Moneyline (+320)
It’s unclear what kind of squad Dortmund manager Niko Kovač will put out there for tomorrow’s second leg, given that his side is already staked to a 3-0 lead, but if he rests players at all — which he might be inclined to do, given Dortmund’s poor position in the league table — picking Sporting on the Moneyline is a high-upside value play. The Portuguese side will come out aggressively, needing to overturn the huge deficit, and they’re plenty talented, even if they’ve struggled since losing star manager Ruben Amorim to Manchester United. Any side that rosters masterful Swedish striker Viktor Gyökeres — who has produced 0.89 goals per 90 minutes in the Champions League so far — has a shot.
Meanwhile, all of Dortmund’s games have been shootouts, as they’ve scored the second-most goals of any team in the competition while allowing the sixth-most of the 24 teams to advance past its League Phase, so it’s not like their defense is solid enough to keep Gyökeres off the score sheet. Dortmund won’t be concerned with an early conceded goal or two, and its only strategy will be to not be broken open at the back. The Germans were clinical in the first leg — especially goalkeeper Gregor Kobel — but they only beat Sporting in expected goals, 1.8-0.7. The match was closer than the score sheet would indicate.
Rodrygo Anytime Goal Scorer (+230)
Of Real Madrid’s tremendous front three, Rodrygo is probably the most underrated. Everyone knows how good Kylian Mbappe is, and similarly, Vinicius Junior was arguably unlucky to finish second in the Ballon d’Or race last season. Mbappe has four goals in the Champions League so far and Vinicius has seven, but Rodrygo has arguably been the most clinical finisher, turning 1.8 expected goals into four goals. The 24-year-old Brazilian right winger was relatively quiet during the first leg, getting his only shot of the game blocked in the 26th minute, but he’s come up clutch for the Galacticos before, netting the team’s only goal during the second-leg tie of last season’s quarterfinal against Manchester City.
Meanwhile, City has been unable to get any kind of consistency going in any competition this season, other than Erling Haaland finding the back of the net, which is virtually guaranteed to happen regardless of the opponent. In their last four matches in all competitions, City lost 5-1 to Arsenal in the Premier League, narrowly beat third-division side Leyton Orient in the FA Cup, lost to Madrid in the Champions League, and picked up a 4-0 decimation of Newcastle United domestically. It’s hard to predict what Manchester City is going to show up, but of those sides, Madrid is closest to Arsenal in quality — not counting itself, of course.
In terms of specific matchups, Josko Gvardiol is Pep Guardiola’s first-choice left back, and while he’s an elite attacker and playmaker for his position, he grades out as merely an average defender. Although he has a high tackle rate — 83.3% — so far in the Champions League, it’s an extremely small sample size. He has just a 53.8% tackle percentage in the Premier League this season, and Rodrygo is significantly above average at successful take-ons both among wingers and forwards in Europe’s Top 5 leagues.
