 "Jude Bellingham admitted that Real Madrid paid the price for poor start to the Champions League. Image: Reuters")
Real Madrid could face Manchester City in the Champions League playoffs after failing to secure an automatic spot in the last 16. Only the teams finishing in the top eight of the new revamped 36-team league phase qualified directly to the last 16 while teams finishing between ninth and 24th will take part in playoffs.
Madrid finished a point outside the top eight places , ending their league campaign with a 3-0 win in Brest on Wednesday. Jude Bellingham scored Real’s second goal in between a double strike from Rodrygo as the Spanish giants proved too strong for the French upstarts in Guingamp.
It was a third straight win to finish the league phase of the Champions League for Real after they started with three defeats in their first five outings, and that poor start is what led to them coming 11th in the standings.
They will face either Manchester City or Celtic in the play-offs in February, with the winners over two legs advancing to the last 16 in March.
‘Real Madrid will face whatever obstacle is to come’
Bellingham has insisted Madrid would be ready for whoever they have to face in the.
“It was important to get the win and finish the group stage strong. I think we probably let ourselves down in a few of the games and that is the reason why we have ended up” in the play-offs, Bellingham told UEFA.com.
“No problem, we’ll try and face whatever obstacle comes with a better face and you can see that we are definitely starting to click as a team in the last few weeks.”
Carlo Ancelotti’s side have won their last five matches in all competitions since a 5-2 pasting at the hands of Barcelona in the Spanish Super Cup final in Saudi Arabia on January 12.
Rodrygo opened the scoring against Brest just before the half-hour mark for Real with a low shot across goalkeeper Marco Bizot and in off the far post, moments after the Brazilian had a header expertly saved.
Mbappe scoring run ends
The visitors were missing Vinicius Junior through suspension and Kylian Mbappe was not on scoring form, having previously netted eight times in the last five games.
But that didn’t matter, as Real survived seeing Brest’s Ludovic Ajorque have a goal disallowed for a tight offside just after half-time before they went 2-0 ahead on 56 minutes.
Bellingham, the player of the match, sparked a breakaway and then arrived in the box to finish off Lucas Vazquez’s low centre.
Rodrygo then scored again on 78 minutes, claiming a brace in a second straight Champions League game, after Mbappe’s shot was saved.
“I think we overlook who scores the goals and that kind of thing because we know that each game it will be someone else, whether it’s Rodrygo’s two and me one tonight, whether it’s Kylian with three the other day,” Bellingham added.
“Someone will always step up with a bit of individual brilliance and the rest of us will focus on the organisation of the team.
“That is maybe what we lacked in a few of the early group games but it seems to be getting better over the last few weeks.”
Real qualified from the league phase despite defeats against Lille, AC Milan and Liverpool, and Bellingham gave the new format a thumbs up overall.
“It has been nice playing more teams of a higher quality and a real mixed group of teams from all over Europe. It’s nice to have a bit more jeopardy,” he said.
Brest are also through to the play-off round after a memorable first ever European campaign which has seen them finish 18th in the table, above the likes of Juventus and Manchester City, despite losing their last two games.
They will play either French rivals Paris Saint-Germain or Benfica in the next round.
“We want to keep going, make even more history than we have already, and if we can continue to get results, why not,” said Bizot.
With agency inputs