Outsiders for the Champions League this Season

As the Champions League enters its quarter-final stage, the bright lights of Europe’s premier competition illuminate eight clubs still harbouring dreams of glory and shocking football odds today. Yet beneath the tournament’s gleaming surface runs a familiar undercurrent – the sense that certain clubs possess an almost divine right to lift that iconic trophy, even with the new European cup format.

Real Madrid and Barcelona, the twin pillars of Spanish footballing aristocracy, once again dominate the betting odds, their histories so intertwined with this competition that their presence in the latter stages feels less like achievement and more like destiny.

The possibility of an El Clásico final in Munich next May hovers over the tournament like a tantalising mirage – a spectacle football romantics both crave and dread in equal measure.

Yet the beauty of football lies in its glorious unpredictability, in those rare moments when the established order crumbles under the weight of audacious dreamers. Six other clubs remain in this dance, each carrying their own wounds and aspirations, their own reasons to believe that this year, finally, the stars might align in their favour.

The new Swiss-style format has already delivered fresh dynamics and unexpected results, suggesting that perhaps the old certainties no longer hold quite so firm. Here are three sides that could cause a shock in Europe’s senior competition.

Inter Milan

There’s a steely resolve about this Inter Milan side that speaks to something deeper than mere tactical discipline. The Nerazzurri carry themselves with the quiet confidence of men who understand their collective strength, their progression past Feyenoord marked not by flamboyance but by character forged in adversity.

Their defensive solidity – spearheaded by the impressive Alessandro Bastoni — provides the foundation upon which their European ambitions rest – a backline that bends but rarely breaks, that absorbs pressure with an almost Italian theatrical stoicism before striking with clinical precision.

In the San Siro’s shadow, manager Simone Inzaghi has crafted a team that mirrors Milan itself: unfashionable perhaps when compared to Europe’s glamour clubs, but possessed of a resilience and craftsmanship that commands respect.

The ghosts of José Mourinho’s 2010 treble-winners still linger in the Milanese air, a reminder that this club knows what it takes to conquer Europe when nobody expects them to.

Borussia Dortmund

Last season’s finalists carry with them the beautiful burden of unfinished business. The pain of Wembley still feels raw – that night when they stood toe-to-toe with Real Madrid only to watch another European crown slip through their fingers. The summer departures of club icons Mats Hummels and Marco Reus, along with manager Edin Terzić, might have signalled a period of rebuilding rather than renewal.

Yet under the guidance of Niko Kovač, something remarkable has happened at the Westfalenstadion that you’d never have really seen coming under Nuri Sahin. The youngest manager in the competition has restored cohesion to a squad that threatened to fragment, but the experience of the former Bayern boss was too tempting to turn away, and he could be the man to get them over the line.

The famous Yellow Wall yearns for continental glory, for validation of their unmatched passion. This Dortmund side, more balanced and mature than last year’s iteration, whispers of possibilities where once they might have shouted of dreams.

Paris Saint-Germain

Given their resources, labelling Paris Saint Germain as outsiders feels almost absurd, yet their relationship with the Champions League resembles an existential crisis more than a sporting challenge.

For all their domestic dominance, European glory remains tantalisingly beyond reach – their sole final appearance ending in heartbreak against Bayern Munich in 2020’s behind-closed-doors showpiece.

The departures of Neymar, Lionel Messi and Kylian Mbappé might have appeared catastrophic on paper, but something unexpected has emerged from beneath those long shadows.

Luis Enrique has crafted a more balanced collective, one less reliant on individual brilliance and more connected to the fundamentals that win knockout competitions – they demonstrated this by beating Liverpool on penalties, one of the pre-tournament favourites.

There’s a poetic symmetry to the possibility of a rematch with Bayern – a chance to exorcise demons in front of supporters this time. Paris hungers for European validation, for proof that their project amounts to more than expensive glamour. Perhaps, stripped of their superstars and expectations, they’ve finally found the formula that has eluded them for so long.