Real Madrid knocked 10-man Manchester City out of the Champions League for the fourth time in five seasons with a 2-1 win at the Etihad Stadium to complete a 5-1 aggregate win for the Spanish giants.
City needed to make history in overturning a 3-0 first-leg deficit against the 15-time European champions, but the difficult task became impossible on Tuesday when captain Bernardo Silva was shown an early red card for handling the ball on his own line.
Vinicius Junior converted the tie from the spot to kill off the contest as City left Madrid for the third year in a row.
Arling Holland equalized for City before half-time, but Vinicius won the game with the final kick of the ball.
Once again, City’s quest for Champions League glory was disrupted as Madrid proved they have the knack of finding their best in the knockout stages of the competition despite their unconvincing form in La Liga.
Alvaro Arbeloa could afford to leave Kylian Mbappe on the bench after his return from injury, while Jude Bellingham could be fit again by the time they face Bayern Munich in the quarter-finals.
City needed a fast start to have any chance of overturning a three-goal deficit against Madrid in European competition, but fell far behind within a minute.
Federico Valverde was an unlikely Real hero last week with his first career hat-trick.
Seven days ago at the Santiago Bernabeu he had the easiest chance of any of Uruguay’s three goals, but Gianluigi Donnarumma fired meekly into the arms after his run from midfield went off-track.
City briefly threatened to revive the tie, but came up against a familiar foe in Thibaut Courtois.
The giant Belgian goalkeeper parried efforts from Ryan Cherky and Rodri, Madrid’s counter-attacking threat killing any lingering City hopes.
Vinicius was initially flagged for offside in the build-up, his effort deflected wide of Silva’s left-hander.
But a VAR review established the Brazilian was offside and referee Clement Turpin had little choice but to dismiss the City captain and point to the penalty spot.
Donnarumma saved a Vinicius penalty in the first leg, but this time he was wrongly sent off from the spot.
Vinicius needed to add more to his 15 goals this season as City pushed forward and exposed themselves at the back.
Twice, he hit the target with only Donnarumma to beat before half-time.
Holland now has 43 for club and country, but had scored just twice from open play in his previous 18 games.
Even when the Norwegian equalised, it came from a mishit as he headed a shot past Courtois from Jeremy Doku’s cross.
Courtois failed to reappear in the second half, while his deputy Andriy Lunin twice denied Holland twice.
Both sides had two goals ruled out for offside before Vinicius finally had one count, heading home Aurelian Tchoumeni’s cross deep into stoppage time.
Arbelova said the quarterfinal against Bayern Munich will be very tough.
“We are improving and if we want to have a chance to win against Bayern Munich, we have to be a team and everyone has to work together and be really tight and compact and show a lot of commitment,” he told Amazon Prime.
“Obviously, Bayern Munich will be really difficult”.
City’s Jeremy Docu said defeat was difficult to take.
“It’s a harsh reality, but when you look at the games, I feel like they weren’t better than us. When you look at the score, it feels like it’s obvious, but it’s not,” he told Amazon.
Elsewhere on Tuesday, Paris Saint-Germain snuffed out any chance of a Chelsea comeback, Khvycha Kvaratskhelia among the scorers, in a clinical 3-0 win at Stamford Bridge that took the holders into the Champions League quarterfinals 8-2 on aggregate.
The Georgian’s early opener was soon followed by a stunning Bradley Barcola strike, swiftly ending Chelsea’s hopes of overturning a 5-2 deficit from the first leg of last week’s last-16 tie.
Substitute Senny Mayulu then fired in PSG’s third in the second half as Luis Enrique’s men progress to a last-eight tie against either Liverpool or Galatasaray next month. Turkey head to Anfield on Wednesday with a 1-0 first leg advantage.
Arsenal’s Eberechi Ize opened his Champions League account with a stunning goal as his side beat Bundesliga side Bayer Leverkusen 2-0 to reach the quarterfinals with a 3-1 aggregate victory on Tuesday.
Leverkusen somehow weathered a flurry of Arsenal pressure in the opening half hour with keeper Janis Blaswicz at his best until Eze’s screamer from outside the area sealed the last-16 tie in the 37th minute.
The tireless Declan Rice made it 2-0 on the hour mark with a precise low finish and Leverkusen, who ended Arsenal’s 100 per cent record in this season’s competition, never really threatened a comeback when they got the better of a 1-1 draw in last week’s first leg.
Premier League leaders Arsenal will face Portuguese side Sporting Lisbon, who thrashed a surprise 5-0 extra-time winner against Bode/Glimt, who won the first leg in Norway.
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