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Kylian Mbappe struck twice as Paris Saint-Germain battled back to beat 10-man Barcelona 4-1 and book a place in the Champions League semi-finals with a 6-4 aggregate triumph on Tuesday.

Raphinha fired Barcelona ahead early on but Ronald Araujo’s 29th-minute red card turned the tide in PSG’s favour, despite the Spanish champions leading by two goals following a 3-2 quarter-final first-leg win.

Ousmane Dembele and Vitinha levelled the tie for PSG and the deadly Mbappe hit a brace to put them into the final four for the first time since 2021.

The French champions have never won the trophy despite huge investment but demonstrated they have the attacking weapons in their squad to do so.

PSG coach Luis Enrique, who led Barca to the 2015 Champions League, said he believed his team would turn things around despite never having managed to after a first-leg home defeat, and so it proved.

“It looked bad but the team concentrated — whatever happened, we had to beat Barcelona,” said Dembele, whistled heavily by fans of his former club.

Five-time winners Barcelona were dreaming of a first semi-final return since 2019 but Araujo’s red card for pulling down the relentless Bradley Barcola undermined their grip on the tie.

It became another in a series of European nightmares for the Catalans, who last won the trophy in 2015.

“In Europe playing with 10 you know you are going to suffer,” Barcelona midfielder Frenkie de Jong told Movistar.

“We tried and we fought to be in the semi-finals, it’s a tough blow because we were convinced we could get through.”

The visitors started with determination and penned Barcelona back in their own territory, but it was the hosts who took the lead.

Explosive 16-year-old starlet Lamine Yamal ripped past Nuno Mendes and crossed to the near post where Raphinha turned home his third goal in the tie.

The other PSG forwards found the net but it was Barcola who tilted the match in PSG’s favour.

The winger teed up Mbappe but Barcelona goalkeeper Marc-Andre ter Stegen denied him well, before Araujo was sent off for bringing him down.

The Uruguayan centre-back pulled Barcola back as he burst into the area, leaving Barca with 10 men.

Dembele struck after 40 minutes from another Barcola cross, which raked across the area to the back post where he was arriving to fire into the roof of the net.

Barcelona sacrificed Yamal for defender Inigo Martinez after Araujo’s red card and it left them with few outlets in attack.

No escape

With PSG controlling the game Barcelona soon paid the price for their inability to keep possession.

Vitinha was given far too much space on the edge of the box and he drilled into the bottom corner to put PSG ahead on the night.

Ilkay Gundogan hit the post at the other end for Barcelona before their coach Xavi was sent off for a show of dissent on the touchline.

The Catalans were losing their heads and Joao Cancelo clumsily fouled Dembele to hand PSG a penalty.

Mbappe, who had been kept quiet in the first leg, hammered it into the top corner for his 40th goal across all competitions.

The striker’s future may lie in Spain, with Real Madrid aiming to sign him in the summer at the end of his contract, and he made no friends in Barcelona by hopping the advertising hoardings and running towards fans to celebrate.

Another member of Barcelona’s backroom staff was dismissed after Gundogan had a penalty appeal waved away and it became clear the hosts had no response.

Mbappe wrapped up the win in the 89th minute after a fine Ter Stegen double save, leaving Barcelona the victims of another bitterly disappointing night in Europe.

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Italy’s Serie A will get an extra place in next season’s revamped Champions League.

With next season’s tournament featuring an expanded field of 36 teams, the two leagues with the best overall performance across all European competitions this campaign will be rewarded with an additional berth each.

Serie A has built an insurmountable coefficient advantage over the other leagues in contention, as detailed by Dale Johnson of ESPN, thus sealing one of the extra places.

Despite Serie A losing all of its Champions League participants earlier in the tournament, both Roma and Atalanta reached the semifinals of the Europa League on Thursday, while Fiorentina are back in the semis of the Conference League.

Instead of the usual four, the top five teams in Serie A this season will automatically qualify for the 2024-25 Champions League.

Germany’s Bundesliga and England’s Premier League are battling for the final extra berth. France still has an outside chance, too. The Bundesliga is in a very strong position after Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund reached the Champions League semifinals, while the Premier League lost Arsenal and Manchester City. Liverpool’s surprising Europa League exit at the hands of Atalanta was also a big blow to the Premier League’s chances.

Serie A has a coefficient of 19.428 points, ahead of Germany (17.928) and England (17.375). Germany needs just 0.488 more coefficient points – equivalent to two victories, or a win and two draws – to nab the other berth, according to Johnson.

Coefficient averages are found by adding the total points accumulated by all of a country’s European participants and dividing by the number of clubs competing. Teams collect two points for each match won and one for a draw. Countries earn bonus points by having representatives in the group and knockout stages.

The Premier League, which had eight teams in European competitions to begin the year, was a favorite to nab one of the extra Champions League places prior to this week’s action.

In addition to losing Manchester City and Arsenal, West Ham United were knocked out of the Europa League by newly-crowned Bundesliga champions Bayer Leverkusen in another direct battle between Germany and England.

Had this system been in place in any of the past three seasons, England would have secured one of the extra spots based on the performances of its teams in Europe. Italy has been the standout performer this year, though.

Access to 2024-25 European competitions in Serie A now breaks down as follows: League positions one through five qualify for the Champions League, sixth place and the domestic cup winners go to the Europa League, and seventh place heads to the Conference League.

Italy could have six teams in the Champions League if Roma or Atalanta win the Europa League and finish outside the automatic qualifying spots in Serie A. Roma is currently fifth in the table, four points ahead of Atalanta in sixth, and stand to benefit most if the table remains the same through the end of the domestic season.

Meanwhile, the race to finish fourth in the Premier League could heat up in the coming weeks with fifth place now unlikely to yield a Champions League berth. Aston Villa currently occupy the final Champions League spot but are likely to face a stiff challenge from Tottenham Hotspur, who sit three points back with a game in hand.

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A sensational Champions League quarterfinal stage is in the books. Before we look ahead to the semis on tap, we’re reviewing the thrilling action that left Real Madrid, Bayern Munich, Paris Saint-Germain, and Borussia Dortmund as the last four teams in Europe’s premier club competition.

Winner: Real Madrid’s aura

Seriously, how do they keep doing this? Manchester City dominated Wednesday’s second leg against Real Madrid by every possible metric. The reigning champions had 34 shot attempts. Real Madrid mustered eight. Pep Guardiola’s team won 18 corner kicks. Carlo Ancelotti’s side earned just one, and that came in extra time. Man City completed twice as many passes and forced the visitors to camp inside their own penalty area for virtually the entire match after Rodrygo’s early opening goal. The pitch may as well have been tilted. Once Kevin De Bruyne smashed home an equalizer from close range in the 76th minute, it felt like the winning goal was only a matter of time for City. To a man, Madrid’s players looked gassed. They exerted so much physical effort simply chasing the ball around for so long and spent even more mental energy trying to maintain their defensive assignments and not lose focus for even a second against City’s swarming press, intricate movement patterns, and attacking onslaught.

And yet, here we are. The perennial kings of the competition are back in the semifinals after a captivating shootout victory, and the holders – who were chasing a second consecutive treble – were left to wonder how, exactly, they were eliminated. Most teams would crumble under the incessant weight of Manchester City’s pressure, but Real Madrid are not most teams. This is their competition. One way or another, they (almost) always find a way. Guardiola’s squad humbled them last season. The 14-time European champions, through sheer willpower and some luck, wouldn’t let it happen again. They’re now the undisputed favorites to hoist the famous big-eared trophy for the 15th time. Who would bet against them?

Loser: Erling Haaland

Haaland wasn’t totally ineffectual at the Etihad. He hit the woodwork with a looping header in the first half and was a menace in the box throughout Wednesday’s contest, occupying the attention of multiple defenders and opening up space for his teammates. That’s baked into City’s style of play and effectiveness. For all the talk of Haaland’s involvement – or lack thereof – in his team’s buildup, the suggestion that he doesn’t contribute enough is simply inaccurate.

But, once again, he failed to find the net against Real Madrid. He came up empty in the one stat that matters most. Julian Alvarez is a sublime talent, but it was still jarring to see Haaland, the world’s most fearsome goalscorer, get the hook heading into extra time. Even with the potential for penalties looming, Guardiola thought the Argentine gave City a better chance to win than the game’s most prolific striker. No matter how you slice it, that’s an indictment on the Norwegian’s performance over the two legs. Real Madrid did an exceptional job keeping Haaland quiet, and much of that credit belongs to one player in particular …

Winner: Antonio Rudiger

Rudiger was a monster in the quarterfinals. He was primarily responsible for shutting Haaland down, especially in the first leg in Madrid, where he effectively shadowed the fearsome forward all game long. His assignment wasn’t quite the same in Wednesday’s return fixture, but he anchored the resilient and resolute Real Madrid backline all the same. It’s what he’s been doing all year, in truth.

Only Fede Valverde has played more minutes than Rudiger for Ancelotti’s side this season. The German held things together after the devastating knee injuries suffered by defensive peers David Alaba and Eder Militao. It was only fitting, then, that he was the one to deliver the decisive spot-kick that sent Real Madrid to the semis, getting a moment directly in the spotlight after doing so much dirty work in the trenches for his team.

Loser: Premier League coefficient

Neither had anything to do with the results, but one of Aston Villa or Tottenham Hotspur could end up being amongst the biggest losers of this week’s quarterfinal matchups. The pendulum just swung violently in favor of the Bundesliga in the German division’s battle with the Premier League to secure a fifth spot in next season’s revamped Champions League. Losing both Arsenal and Manchester City while seeing Borussia Dortmund and Bayern Munich advance leaves the Premier League’s chances of securing the additional berth for the 2024-25 tournament hanging by a thread.

Barring some stunning comebacks in the Europa League, everything could be sorted by Thursday evening, with Italy’s Serie A the other top tier all but assured of getting the coveted extra place. Suddenly, the scrap for fourth place in England’s top tier – a direct shootout between Villa and Tottenham – carries more weight in the campaign’s final weeks.

Winner: Ousmane Dembele

Ousmane Dembele faced harsh, often over-the-top criticism from every angle during his time in Barcelona. Fans, pundits, and even club executives – chief among them Barca president Joan Laporta – criticized the French winger incessantly, especially as his contract saga dragged on before his eventual transfer to Paris Saint-Germain. Though he was gracious when discussing his ex-club after Tuesday’s seesaw victory, inside, Dembele surely revelled in knocking Barcelona out of the Champions League. How could he not?

That he played a starring role likely only made it sweeter. The lithe winger has only scored three goals all season, but two of them came against Barca in the quarterfinal tie, including the resounding finish into the roof of the net that helped kickstart PSG’s comeback in Montjuic. Dembele, ruthlessly jeered by the Barcelona fans every time he touched the ball Tuesday, is heading to the Champions League semifinals, and his PSG side will be fancied to beat Borussia Dortmund and reach the showpiece match. Barca, meanwhile, can do nothing but lick the wounds inflicted on them by their former player.

Loser: Xavi

Ahead of the second leg against PSG, Xavi talked at length about the importance of maintaining a cool head and not losing focus. That, he said, would be crucial if Barcelona wanted to reach the Champions League semifinals for the first time since 2019. But when it came time to practice what he preached, the manager imploded. His team followed his lead. Xavi, incensed by the first-half red card shown to Ronald Araujo, lampooned referee Istvan Kovacs after the match, branding the Romanian official a “disaster” who “does not understood football.” The sending-off obviously changed the entire complexion of the tie, but, ultimately, it was the correct decision.

Despite Araujo’s lengthy protestations, there were multiple points of contact that brought Bradley Barcola down, and Pau Cubarsi hadn’t retreated far enough to be considered the last defender on the play. Xavi never recovered from that incident. Every subsequent decision that went against his team was met with a sarcastic reaction on the touchline. It was no surprise, then, when he finally went overboard and got himself sent off for an absurd response to a routine foul call. The timing couldn’t have been worse; Xavi’s red card came two minutes after Vitinha scored to level the tie at four apiece. He can blame the referee all he wants, but with his team self-destructing, the outgoing bench boss needed to keep his composure. Though a man down and with all the momentum against them, Barca were still just one shot away from taking an aggregate lead at the time. Instead, four minutes after his coach was dismissed, Joao Cancelo, who himself had a rough outing, conceded a foolish penalty that effectively completed Barcelona’s collapse.

Winner: Jadon Sancho

Just a few short months ago, Sancho found himself banished from the Manchester United squad amid a bitter public feud with headstrong manager Erik ten Hag. His season totally derailed, the English winger’s entire career was at risk of stagnation at just 24 years old. Now he’s a protagonist for a Borussia Dortmund side enjoying an unlikely run to the Champions League semis, while his Dutch adversary is fighting to save his tenuous job every week. Fortunes can change quickly.

Sancho may not have been the main reason Dortmund managed to turn the tide against Atletico Madrid, but his inventiveness and dribbling ability have added an extra spark to a Dortmund attack that often looked stale and bereft of ideas before his January arrival. They’ll be heavy underdogs in their semifinal clash with PSG, but if Sancho is on his game, he can cause problems for the French club’s backline, especially in transition.

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Borussia Dortmund flipped the script.

Trailing 4-3 on aggregate after an onslaught of Atletico Madrid pressure in the second half of their quarterfinal clash, it appeared as though the German side had run out of steam following a strong start to Tuesday’s second leg at the Westfalenstadion.

But there was still another twist to come. Two, actually.

Dortmund turned the tie around with a pair of goals in a frenetic three-minute spell. An imposing 71st-minute header from Niclas Fullkrug brought them level on aggregate, and a ferocious left-footed strike from Marcel Sabitzer in the 74th minute completed the comeback, eliminating the stubborn Spanish side 5-4 on aggregate and sending Dortmund to the semifinals of the Champions League for the first time since 2013.

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Dortmund, trailing 2-1 from last week’s first leg in Spain, were buoyed by their famously boisterous crowd and came flying out of the gate, taking a 2-0 lead into halftime through goals from Julian Brandt and Ian Maatsen.

Diego Simeone reacted to his team’s sluggish opening stanza by making three changes coming out of the interval, and that seemed to jolt his squad back to life. The introduction of Angel Correa was particularly impactful, as the diminutive Argentine attacker scored to put Atletico back on top in the tie after a calamitous Mats Hummels own goal had leveled proceedings.

The seesaw affair then took its final turn as Fullkrug and Sabitzer delivered blows from which Atletico couldn’t recover.

“It was magical. I try not to go overboard in interviews, but it was really magical. The stadium was on fire today,” Fullkrug said after the match.

Edin Terzic’s men, sitting fifth in the Bundesliga and far from certain to qualify for next season’s Champions League amid an uneven campaign, will now meet Paris Saint-Germain in the semifinals. The French club knocked out Barcelona on Tuesday in a similarly back-and-forth matchup.