Chelsea v Porto In The Quarter Finals Of The Champions League
From the official Chelsea FC website:
CHELSEA TO FACE PORTO IN CHAMPIONS LEAGUE QUARTER-FINAL
Chelsea will meet Porto at the quarter-final stage of this season’s Champions League, while a semi-final clash with either Real Madrid or Liverpool awaits the victors.
The Blues defeated Atletico Madrid 3-0 on aggregate in the Round of 16, with goals from Hakim Ziyech and Emerson securing a 2-0 second leg win on Wednesday to add to our 1-0 away win in the Spanish capital.
That victory sets up a quarter-final clash with the Portuguese club, with our potential semi-final opponents also confirmed.
The first leg will be played away and will take place on the 6/7 April, with the return leg at Stamford Bridge a week later on 13/14 April. Kick-off times for both games will be announced in due course.
If we make the semi-finals, those would be on 27/28 April and 4/5 May.
Chelsea and Porto have a significant past in the Champions League having been drawn together four times previously, but only once in the knockout stages.
The first occasion made big news as in 2004/05, our new manager was Jose Mourinho had been in charge at Porto when they lifted the trophy the previous season.
In the group stage, his new club won 3-1 at Stamford Bridge with goals from Alexey Smertin, Didier Drogba and John Terry. Away from home, despite a Damien Duff goal giving us the lead, we lost 2-1 but progressed as far as the semi-finals. Porto went out in the last-16.
Two seasons later, we met the side from the banks of the Douro in the first knockout stage and went through 3-2 on aggregate. It was poised 1-1 after the first leg, Andriy Shevchenko having equalised a goal from future Blue Raul Meireles despite the loss of skipper Terry early on due to injury. Although another player who would later move to Stamford Bridge, Ricardo Quaresma, gave us a scare by scoring first in the second leg, goals from Arjen Robben and Michael Ballack won the day. Another semi-final exit beckoned.
In the group stage in 2009/10, there were two tight games, both won 1-0 thanks to Nicolas Anelka strikes. We topped the group with Porto second but the side that would on to win the domestic Double exited in Europe to Mourinho’s Inter Milan.
Our most recent meetings were also group-stage encounters – back under Mourinho in 2015/16. Porto won 2-1 at the Estadio do Dragao, Willian the Chelsea scorer, and the Brazilian was also on target at the Bridge where an own-goal contributed to a 2-0 win. It was Mourinho’s final home game as manager. That season we went out in the first knockout round against PSG.
Full Draw:
Quarter-finals
Semi-finals
- Winner QF 3vWinner QF 1
- Winner QF 4vWinner QF 2
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