"Football is good like that, there's always another opportunity. We've won here and we're into the quarterfinals. It's a very important game for our confidence. From the start of the season we've had some good games, but we haven't always controlled them like we did in this tie. We were clear what we had to do, work hard and take our chances, even though I missed a lot of them!"
"When the two teams met in February of 2025, fans in Manchester displayed a banner picturing midfielder Rodri holding the Ballon d'Or, which he had won ahead of Vinicius. After missing a penalty in last week's first leg, Vinicius sent keeper Gianluigi Donnarumma the wrong way with Tuesday's spot kick, and celebrated by posing, then leaning on the corner flag, before making a prolonged 'crying' gesture with both hands."
Vinicius Junior delivered a dominant performance in Real Madrid's 2-1 Champions League round-of-16 second leg win at Manchester City, scoring twice to secure a 5-1 aggregate progression to the quarterfinals. He converted a 22nd-minute penalty and added a second goal in added time. His celebration included a prolonged 'crying' gesture, directly responding to a banner Manchester City fans displayed in February featuring Rodri with the Ballon d'Or, which Rodri won ahead of Vinicius. The Brazilian also made a '4-0' gesture to the crowd. Despite missing several chances throughout the match, Vinicius generated seven shots with an expected goals value of 2.58, demonstrating his attacking threat.
#champions-league #real-madrid-vs-manchester-city #vinicius-junior #ballon-dor-rivalry #penalty-conversion
Read at ESPN.com
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