Kevin de Bruyne went a long way to paying back his £55m transfer fee – reported by BBC Sport – by firing Manchester City into the Champions League semi-finals for the first time in their history.
The Belgian scored the only goal at the Etihad Stadium tonight to settle City’s quarter-final tie with Paris Saint-Germain, and it was a worthy winner to secure the hosts a 3-2 aggregate victory.
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PSG keeper Kevin Trapp had no chance as De Bruyne expertly picked out the bottom corner with a bending strike, and the composure to take the extra touch in the build up was just as impressive.
Sergio Aguero is so often City’s hero, but he needed De Bruyne to bail him out this evening after the Argentine striker missed a first-half penalty while the score was still at 2-2 from the first leg.
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Zlatan Ibrahimovic, who missed a penalty himself in last week’s fixture in France, thought that he had set up a nervy finale with this late close-range strike, but was found to be several yards offside.
City deserved to go through based on their performance over the two legs, and their previous misfortune in the Champions League. They had not advanced beyond the last 16 in their last four seasons.
But this year is different, and De Bruyne deserves plenty of credit for that. He scored a 90th-minute winner against Sevilla in the group stage, and also found the net in the first leg against PSG.
City were joined in the semis by Real Madrid as a Cristiano Ronaldo hat-trick overturned Wolfsburg’s 2-0 lead. Barcelona and Pep Guardiola’s Bayern Munich might follow suit. That could be interesting…
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