The first week of the new 2024/25 UEFA Champions League season is in the books, and boy oh boy was it an eventful one.
There were record-breaking wins, shock defeats, all-time great saves across the three days of Champions League football.
And after all of that fun, here’s 90min’s picks for the UEFA Champions League team of Gameweek 1.
Had David Raya not made arguably the greatest double save in the history of mankind, then Thibaut Courtois would’ve been in this team thanks to his great performance vs Stuttgart.
However, Raya did make arguably the greatest double save in history of mankind to deny Mateo Retegui on two occasions in quick succession, so he’s made this team.
Joshua Kimmich has looked like man re-born since Thomas Tuchel left Bayern Munich, and his resurgence continued in the Champions League this week.
The Germany international was extremely effective alongside new right-sided partner Michael Olise against Dinamo Zagreb, setting up two of Bayern’s nine goals on the night (yes, nine).
Real Madrid’s Champions League clash with Stuttgart was perhaps a busier game than Antonio Rudiger was expecting, but the defender rose to the challenge.
From a defensive perspective, Rudiger was pretty impeccable – winning 100% of his tackles and duels, and clearing his lines and impressive six times.
From an offensive perspective, he was also pretty impeccable too – scoring a header in the 83rd minute, and completing 91% of his passes.
Jose Gimenez scored one of the most important goals of Gameweek 1 of the 2024/25 Champions League.
With the scores locked level between Atletico Madrid and a talented RB Leipzig side, the defender popped up at the back post to head home a last minute winner.
Nice one.
Bayer Leverkusen got their first Champions League campaign under Xabi Alonso off to a flying start this week away at Feyenoord, and a key reason for that was Alex Grimaldo.
The Spain international was in fantastic form during the 4-0 victory, bagging a goal at one end and winning a whopping seven duels and 100% of his tackles at the other.
Considering the fact that Bayern Munich beat Dinamo Zagreb 9-2, it is surprising that Jamal Musiala didn’t get on the scoresheet.
Despite the lack of goals however, Musiala still managed to make huge contributions in the win. The most notable of which were his two assists and the seven chances he created for his teammates. A real playmaker’s performance from the youngster.
Celtic enjoyed a famous European night at Parkhead on Tuesday evening, recording their biggest ever Champions League win by thumping Slovan Bratislava 5-1.
Key to that historic win was the performance of summer signing Arne Engels. The young Belgian ran the show in the middle of the park, scoring one and creating another in the victory.
He may be 33 now, but Antoine Griezmann is still one of the most effective attacking players in Europe.
The France star proved that once again on Thursday, scoring a wonderful volleyed effort in the first half, and then finding the head of Gimenez with a curling cross to set up the winner for Atleti.
Yes, there’s a lot of Bayern players in this team, but they did win 9-2 so…
New signing Michael Olise has taken to life in Bavaria like a duck to water, and continued to impress in midweek in the Champions League.
After scoring one in the weekend win over Holstein Kiel, Olise added to more to his Bayern tally in the win over Zagreb.
It’s been a banner few weeks for Harry Kane.
The forward earned his 100th cap with England during the international break, and then returned to club action to net two consecutive hat-tricks – the second of which, against Zagreb, also saw him break the all-time English goalscoring record in the Champions League.
All in, September has been good to Kane.
Considering how bloody brilliant Florian Wirtz is, it came as a surprise that the clash with Feyenoord was his first ever game in the Champions League.
He played like someone making up for lost time in his competition debut too. The German netted two of Leverkusen’s four goals on the day, proving himself to be more than capable of playing at this level.
