Man City ends Chelsea's season-long unbeaten run with 2-0 win in Women's Champions League

MANCHESTER, England (AP) — Manchester City ended Chelsea's unbeaten run this season as Vivianne Miedema scored twice to give her team a 2-0 win in the Women's Champions League quarterfinals on Wednesday.

Four days after Chelsea beat City to win the English League Cup, injury-hit City became the first team to beat Chelsea under coach Sonia Bompastor in her team's 29th game of the season.

Miedema came off the bench at halftime and made the difference in the 60th minute, pouncing on the rebound after Chelsea goalkeeper Hannah Hampton tipped Laia Aleixandri's header onto the crossbar. Her second was a clinical finish in the 89th off Kerolin's pass after Chelsea had been pushing to level the score.

It was a triumphant display of the impact Miedema can still have at Champions League level despite repeated setbacks with knee injuries since tearing her ACL in 2022. Her most recent operation was just five months ago.

Chelsea had one goal by Mayra Ramirez ruled out for offside before Johanna Rytting Kaneryd nearly scored soon after with a shot that hit the bar. Maika Hamano reached the rebound first but couldn't emulate Miedema as her shot was saved.

“We didn’t play with a lot of desire. We need to run to make more effort as a team, but also as individuals," Bompastor said. "Sometimes it’s easy to talk about tactics, but football is about running and making sure you put all your effort in on the pitch, so maybe we were a little bit sloppy in that aspect tonight.”

It was the second of four consecutive games between Chelsea and City in the space of 12 days across three different competitions, and only City's second game since reappointing interim coach Nick Cushing. The two teams next play Sunday in the Women's Super League before their Champions League second leg March 27.

Earlier, Barcelona took a big step toward a third straight Women's Champions League title by beating Wolfsburg 4-1 in the first leg of their quarterfinal encounter.

In the first meeting of the two teams since Barcelona beat Wolfsburg 3-2 in the 2023 Champions League final, Barcelona showed how the gap between the two teams has only grown.

Barcelona dominated throughout and largely shut Wolfsburg's forwards out of the game as former Wolfsburg player Ewa Pajor caused her old team plenty of problems.

Barcelona took the lead when Pajor, who joined Barcelona from Wolfsburg last year, pressured defender Caitlin Dijkstra into conceding an own goal as she tried to stop Pajor connecting with Aitana Bonmati's cross in the 26th.

Two goals in the space of three minutes early in the second half took the game further away from Wolfsburg as Irene Paredes scored to finish off a short corner routine before Salma Paralluelo made it 3-0 soon after with a deflected shot.

Wolfsburg had some hope of a comeback when Janina Minge scored a header from a corner in the 79th, but Barcelona's 18-year-old substitute Sydney Schertenleib responded with a curled shot that went in off the crossbar.

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Manchester City's Vivianne Miedema, second left, celebrates after scoring her side's second goal during the Women's Champions League, quarter-final first leg, soccer match between Manchester City and Chelsea FC in Manchester, England, Wednesday, March 19, 2025. (Nick Potts/PA via AP)

Manchester City's Vivianne Miedema, center, celebrates after scoring her side's second goal during the Women's Champions League, quarter-final first leg, soccer match between Manchester City and Chelsea FC in Manchester, England, Wednesday, March 19, 2025. (Nick Potts/PA via AP)

Barcelona's Ewa Pajor plays the ball during the Women's Champions League, quarter-final first leg, soccer match between VfL Wolfsburg and FC Barcelona in Wolfsburg, Germany, Wednesday, March 19, 2025. (Swen Pfoertner/dpa via AP)

Barcelona's players celebrate their side's third goal during the Women's Champions League, quarter-final first leg, soccer match between VfL Wolfsburg and FC Barcelona in Wolfsburg, Germany, Wednesday, March 19, 2025. (Swen Pfoertner/dpa via AP)

Barcelona's players Alexia Putellas, right, and Aitana Bonmati celebrate the opening goal during the Women's Champions League, quarter-final first leg, soccer match between VfL Wolfsburg and FC Barcelona in Wolfsburg, Germany, Wednesday, March 19, 2025. (Swen Pfoertner/dpa via AP)

Chelsea manager Sonia Bompastor during the Women's Champions League, quarter-final first leg, soccer match between Manchester City and Chelsea FC in Manchester, England, Wednesday, March 19, 2025. ( Martin Rickett/PA via AP)

Manchester City's Vivianne Miedema, left, celebrates after scoring the opening goal during the Women's Champions League, quarter-final first leg, soccer match between Manchester City and Chelsea FC in Manchester, England, Wednesday, March 19, 2025. ( Martin Rickett/PA via AP)

Manchester City's Vivianne Miedema, front, celebrates after scoring the opening goal during the Women's Champions League, quarter-final first leg, soccer match between Manchester City and Chelsea FC in Manchester, England, Wednesday, March 19, 2025. (Nick Potts/PA via AP)

Fewer than a million perfect brackets remained on ESPN and just over a million were left on the NCAA's platform midway through the first day of the NCAA Tournament on Thursday.

ESPN's perfect bracket tracker listed 806,020 remaining out of more than 24 million filled out on its site following the seventh game of the day, No. 6 seed BYU's 80-71 win over No. 11 seed VCU. The NCAA listed about 1,100,000 perfect brackets out of more than 34 million.

CBS, which reports its perfect brackets by percentage, said it had about 3.2% unblemished following the BYU win.

About 6.6 million brackets were busted on ESPN when No. 12 seed McNeese beat No. 5 seed Clemson 69-67.

Creighton — which saw a boost in this category because it played the first game of the day — was listed as the No. 1 bracket buster after its 89-75 win over Louisville. There were 13,339,089 ESPN brackets busted by that game.

AP March Madness bracket: https://apnews.com/hub/ncaa-mens-bracket and coverage: https://apnews.com/hub/march-madness. Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here.

Clemson guard Jaeden Zackery, left, react after a loss to McNeese State in the first round of the NCAA college basketball tournament, Thursday, March 20, 2025, in Providence, R.I. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)