With the help of the AI-powered Opta supercomputer, we provide our UEFA Champions League match predictions for every game across each matchday.
The UEFA Champions League season in 2023-24 promises to be one of the best in recent memory.
Manchester City won their first ever UCL title in 2022-23 thanks to a 1-0 win over Internazionale, but can they become just the second club to retain the Champions League trophy after Real Madrid’s three successive titles between 2016 and 2018? With Europe’s biggest and best clubs competing, it’ll be a tough task.
The AI-powered Opta supercomputer will be making its predictions for every fixture over the course of what looks set to be an exciting UCL season.
Read on, as Opta Analyst provides its UEFA Champions League match predictions and be sure to check back here ahead of each matchday.
We look over the Opta supercomputer match predictions for all four of this week’s ties.
Last 16 – Leg 2 (5-6 March)
The Quick Hits
- Inter Milan are looking to break a club record by winning their 14th successive match in all competitions.
- Despite losing the first leg of their tie 1-0, Arsenal are the second most favoured team to progress to the quarter-finals of the eight sides playing this week (63.1%)
- Napoli vs Barcelona and PSV vs Borussia Dortmund are finely poised with both ties seeing their first-leg matches end 1-1.
Arsenal vs Porto
Arsenal come into this second leg at the Emirates Stadium with a 1-0 deficit to overturn, as FC Porto caught them on a rare off day in the first leg in Portugal.
Galeno’s excellent strike in added time handed the Portuguese giants a slender lead before their trip to London on Tuesday, but the Opta supercomputer isn’t giving them much chance of replicating that feat.
Mikel Arteta’s side won 73.0% of the pre-match simulations inside 90 minutes, while they are projected to reach the quarter-finals 63.1% of the time – potentially needing extra time or penalties to advance past Porto. History doesn’t bode well for Porto, with them losing all three of their previous away trips to Arsenal by an aggregate score of 11-0. In fact, they have never won a European match in England in 22 attempts (D3 L19).
The Gunners are in excellent form, winning eight of their last nine competitive matches – the defeat in Porto the only blip – with their last four home games all ending in victory. Saturday’s 2-1 win over Brentford took them top of the Premier League.
Porto enjoyed a 3-0 away win at Portimonense on Friday night to follow their exceptional 5-0 rout of Benfica the weekend previous. Galeno scored again this weekend in the win, meaning he’s netted six goals in Porto’s last six competitive matches.
Barcelona vs Napoli
Napoli and Barcelona couldn’t be separated in the first leg of this tie, with the two sides playing out a 1-1 draw in Naples. Last season’s Serie A champions are yet to beat Barcelona in a competitive match (D3 L2) but might only need a draw to progress from this tie.
The Opta supercomputer isn’t too positive on Napoli’s chances, however. Across 10,000 pre-match simulations, they only made it through to the quarter-finals 38.4% of the time compared to Barcelona’s projected chance of 61.6%.
Napoli have been eliminated on each of the previous 11 occasions they’ve failed to win the first leg of a major European competition knockout stage tie at home. The most recent such instance was against Barcelona in the 2019-20 UEFA Champions League, drawing 1-1 at home before losing 3-1 away.
Robert Lewandowski scored Barcelona’s goal in the first leg of this tie, cementing his place among the top scorers in Champions League history. He’s been involved in 18 goals in his last 12 appearances in the knockout rounds of the Champions League, scoring 12 and assisting six. He’s also had a hand in 11 goals in his last 10 games against Italian sides in the competition (7 goals, 4 assists).
Atlético Madrid vs Inter Milan
Diego Simeone will take charge of his 50th home game in the UEFA Champions League on Wednesday as his Atlético Madrid side host Inter Milan, needing to come back from a goal down to progress to the quarters.
Inter won 1-0 in the San Siro in the first leg thanks to Marko Arnautović’s second-half strike, which sealed their ninth competitive win in a row. That run is now at 13 wins in succession and victory in this match would break a new club record (14), beating the previous record of 13 games set in 2007-08 under Roberto Mancini.
Inter have conceded just three goals in their last 11 matches in all competitions, and Atlético need to score at least once in this match to have any chance of progressing to the next round.
The Opta supercomputer is giving them a 24.1% chance of doing so – the lowest of all eight teams playing in the competition this week.
Atlético didn’t warm up for this game in the best manner, as they lost 2-0 to La Liga strugglers Cádiz on Saturday.
Borussia Dortmund vs PSV
This tie is finely poised following a 1-1 draw in Eindhoven in the first leg – Luuk de Jong equalising in the second half from the penalty spot after Donyell Malen’s first-half opener for BVB.
PSV have enjoyed a brilliant season so far as they lead the Dutch Eredivisie table by 10 points and are still unbeaten after 25 matches, dropping just six points all season (W22 D3 L0). They come into this game off the back of a 1-0 win at Go Ahead Eagles on Friday evening.
Going away to Dortmund won’t be easy, however. The German side are unbeaten in their last eight Champions League home games (W4 D4), though their last such defeat was in their last match against Dutch opponents (3-1 vs Ajax). They last had a longer run without defeat at home in the competition between December 1996 and September 1999 (9).
PSV are looking to reach the Champions League quarter-final for just the third time, previously doing so in 2004-05 and 2006-07. The Opta supercomputer is giving them a 42.2% chance of progressing this time, potentially needing extra time or penalties to get past the Germans.
Champions League Last 16 Ties in Full
Manchester City beat FC Copenhagen (6-2 on aggregate)
Real Madrid beat RB Leipzig (2-1 on aggregate)
Paris Saint-Germain beat Real Sociedad (4-1 on aggregate)
Bayern Munich beat Lazio (3-1 on aggregate)
Atletico Madrid vs Inter Milan (0-1 after first leg)
Borussia Dortmund vs PSV (1-1 after first leg)
Arsenal vs Porto (0-1 after first leg))
Barcelona vs Napoli (1-1 after first leg)
*All prediction numbers are correct at the time of publication.
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