With the help of the AI-powered Opta supercomputer, we provide our UEFA Champions League match predictions for every game across 2024-25.
The Opta supercomputer will be with us every step of the way this season as the projection model works to provide you with data-backed predictions for all UEFA Champions League matches and season outcomes.
Real Madrid have won the most European Cup/Champions League titles (15), with nine of those coming in the UCL era since 1992. They’ll be looking to add yet another this season following their 2023-24 success in the final against Borussia Dortmund at Wembley Stadium.
Manchester City are likely to be their biggest rivals in the quest for European glory in 2024-25, with Pep Guardiola’s side having won their first title in 2023 versus Internazionale. Fellow Premier League side Arsenal are also highly fancied, but they’re yet to win a UCL title despite this being their 21st season in the competition.
Now, all of that is a little far in the future to be given much consideration yet, but our AI-powered Opta supercomputer proved rather prescient in 2023-24 and is continuing to make predictions for every fixture this season.
Read on as Opta Analyst provides its Champions League match predictions for 2024-25, and be sure to check back here ahead of every matchday for the latest UCL projections.
Matchday 2 Predictions
Tuesday 1 October
Matchday 2 of the 2024-25 UEFA Champions League kicks off on Tuesday night with two early matches in Stuttgart and Salzburg.
Sparta Prague and Brest are the away sides in these games, with the two teams looking to pick up more points in the league phase after impressive wins on MD 1. Czech side Sparta dominated RB Salzburg at home, winning 3-0 in Prague, but are given just a 17.9% chance by the Opta supercomputer of winning at VfB Stuttgart in this game.
Salzburg will be looking to get their UCL campaign going after that disappointing performance on the opening matchday. Their meeting with unfancied Ligue 1 side Brest gives them that opportunity, with the Austrian team favourites with the supercomputer (45.5%).
Both Barcelona and Manchester City won over 80% of the 10,000 pre-match simulations with the Opta supercomputer – facing Young Boys and Slovan Bratislava, respectively. In fact, Barca and City are the most likely teams to win on MD 2 according to the supercomputer’s pre-match projections.
Barcelona lost in Monaco on MD 1, but home comforts should bring them more joy this time around. They have only lost their opening home game of a UEFA Champions League campaign in one of their previous 28 tournament appearances (W25 D2), with that lone defeat coming in 2021-22 against Bayern Munich (0-3).
Pep Guardiola’s Man City face Slovakian opposition for the first time ever in the UCL, with this being Slovan Bratislava’s first home game in the competition. It couldn’t get much harder than starting with a game against City, however, with the Premier League side looking to equal an all-time record: should City win or draw this match, they will equal the record for the longest unbeaten run in European Cup/UEFA Champions League history, currently held by Manchester United (25 games between September 2007 and May 2009).
Another Premier League side, Arsenal, are also projected to pick up all three points on Tuesday night. They face Ligue 1 giants Paris Saint-Germain at the Emirates Stadium, with these two clubs having played more games in UCL history than anyone else who has not won the trophy (Arsenal: 188, PSG: 150). The Gunners were perhaps lucky to come away from Bergamo with a draw against Atalanta on MD 1, while PSG were fortunate themselves, after a late own goal gifted them a 1-0 win over Girona. Arsenal won 52.8% of the pre-match supercomputer simulations, with PSG coming out on top 23.8% of the time.
The Opta supercomputer backs home wins for Bayer Leverkusen (54.2%) versus Milan, Borussia Dortmund (61.4%) against Celtic, and Internazionale (76.6%) versus Crvena Zvezda, with Sporting CP the only side other than Man City predicted to win away from home across Tuesday night’s nine Champions League matches. The Portuguese club won 40.8% of the pre-match simulations versus Dutch side PSV.
Wednesday 2 October
Away teams look like they could have much more joy in Wednesday night’s UCL action, with six of the nine matches seeing the away team favoured to win according to the pre-match Opta supercomputer simulations.
Real Madrid opened up their Champions League defence with a win over Stuttgart on MD 1, and they are heavily backed to add three more points on MD 2 away at Lille (63.1%). Carlo Ancelotti’s side are now unbeaten in 14 UEFA Champions League games (W10 D4) but have lost their last two UCL away games against French opposition without scoring a single goal – 3-0 against Paris Saint-Germain in 2019 and a 1-0 defeat against PSG in 2022.
Other teams with more than 50% likelihood of victory on the road on MD 2 are Atalanta (59.2%) at Shakhtar Donetsk, Monaco (51.8%) at Dinamo Zagreb and Bayern Munich (53.1%) at Aston Villa.
Bayern enjoyed a 9-2 victory over Dinamo Zagreb on MD 1, as they became the first team in UEFA Champions League history to score nine goals in a single match and Harry Kane was the first player to score three penalties in the same game. A trip to Aston Villa will surely prove much more difficult against a good Premier League side with Unai Emery in the dugout.
The Spaniard has already beaten Bayern in the Champions League on two previous occasions, winning 3-0 in September 2017 in charge of PSG and 1-0 in April 2022 with Villarreal. The only manager to beat Bayern in the competition with as many as three different teams is José Mourinho (Chelsea, Internazionale and Real Madrid).
Liverpool are deemed the most likely side to win on Wednesday by the Opta supercomputer, with their projected win likelihood at 75.7% at the time of writing. They face Serie A side Bologna at Anfield – a venue that Liverpool have won their last 10 group/league stage matches at in major European competition. Their last defeat there did come against Italian opposition, however (Atalanta in 2020), and they have lost to seven different Italian clubs there – Bologna could make that eight.
Other home wins are expected on Wednesday from Girona (49.9%) against Feyenoord and RB Leipzig (47.4%) versus Juventus, while the supercomputer has had trouble separating Sturm Graz (35.9%) and Club Brugge (37.8%).
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