Champions League Week 1 Predictions: Mourinho Reunion Leads a Loaded Return
The returning Jose Mourinho welcomes the side he led to a historic treble at the Bernabeu, Arsenal look to bounce back from their penalty heartbreak in Budapest and Manchester United make their long-awaited return to the competition after a two-year absence.
Could it get much bigger? Check out our Champions League Matchday 1 predictions for how we see it all going down throughout Europe.
Odds correct at time of publication but subject to change.
Club Brugge vs Aston Villa
This isn’t the first time Club Brugge have met Aston Villa on the grandest stage in club football.
The Belgian Pro League champions have faced Villa on three separate occasions in the Champions League, losing all but the first close to two years ago.
Unai Emery’s side responded in kind by beating them across both legs in the round of 16 that same year by an aggregate of 6-1 to advance to the quarter-finals of the competition before bowing out to eventual winners PSG.
Any hope of another deep run feels like a stretch with how much change has shaken Villa in recent months.
Ollie Watkins, Youri Tielemans, Ezri Konsa and Emi Martinez now apply their trade at other clubs, leaving the Villans with plenty of new additions but no real guile and no goals in the Premier League after three games played to show for it.
Club Brugge, meanwhile, have kept clean sheets in both matches at Jan Breydel Stadium this season, scoring four goals at home and nine overall.
Nicolo Tresoldi is the name to look out for here.
The German striker scored 19 goals in Belgium last season – two more than Christos Tzolis off the back of his record-setting campaign – and has scored three times already this term in blue and black.
Tresoldi found the back of the net three times in the Champions League last year and is 7/5 with BetMGM to re-open his European account against Villa.
BetMGM selection: Tresoldi to score anytime @ 7/5
Porto vs Manchester City
After picking up the maximum amount of points in the league after three matches played, Enzo Maresca’s Manchester City travel to The Undefeated City for round one of the competition.
Like our first game, Porto have met City many times in Europe throughout the years but are yet to taste victory over the 2022/23 Champions League winners.
Francesco Farioli’s side are more than ready for this challenge, though, with five wins from five to sit atop the Primeira Liga – picking up exactly where they left off after ending Sporting CP’s reign at the top of the mountain.
That said, his side will be without many first-team players due to injury in Vasco Sousa, Oskar Pietuszewski, Gabriel Mec, Zaidu Sanusi and Samu Aghehowa.
The suspended Jan Bednarek will be another massive miss for the Dragons – leaving his fellow countryman and former Arsenal defender Jakob Kiwior with the arduous task of taming Erling Haaland.
With Porto looking mighty thin and City looking anything but, there most certainly will be goals at Estadio do Dragao.
Over 2.5 goals has landed in 13 of Man City’s last 15 UCL away matches – as well as in three of their four domestic matches this season already – and is currently priced at 16/25.
BetMGM selection: Over 2.5 goals @ 16/25
Real Madrid vs Inter
It doesn’t get much bigger than this.
Easily the biggest game of the week sees Mourinho welcome Inter – the club he personally led to an era-defining Champions League, Serie A and Coppa Italia treble in 2010 – to what is sure to be a raucous Bernabeu.
There’s value to be found across our Real Madrid vs Inter markets if you’re looking in Kylian Mbappe’s direction but we’re looking at the opposite end of the pitch for this one; at Dean Huijsen, in particular.
The former Bournemouth centre-back has drawn a foul in two of his last four games in La Liga and will be up against two relentless pressers that don’t mind a battle or two (or three) in Lautaro Martinez and Marcus Thuram.
Martinez alone has committed the most fouls for the Nerazzurri in Serie A, including two against Napoli this past weekend, not including the seven fouls across his four starts for Argentina at the World Cup.
That alone puts Huijsen to be fouled two or more times in pretty good stead – especially at 4/1.
BetMGM selection: Huijsen to be fouled 2+ times @ 4/1
Barcelona vs Feyenoord
No side has scored more goals across Europe’s top five leagues so far than Barcelona, with multiple players recording multiple goals and assists despite only playing a handful of games.
It’s the sort of away game you dread if you’re Feyenoord… even for a club with a European Cup and two UEFA Cups in the trophy cabinet.
Very few are enjoying life in the sunshine of Barcelona more than Anthony Gordon at the moment.
Only Juanito for Real Madrid in 1980/81, Míchel also for Real Madrid in 1987/88 and Lionel Messi for Barca in 2011/12 have assisted more than the England international in their first four La Liga matches.
In the Champions League, he’s known to go up a level or two, too.
Gordon scored 10 of his 17 goals for Newcastle last season in Europe and was a constant threat on that left wing – form that seems to have translated well since moving to Los Cules.
Gordon is 1/2 to score or assist against the Eredivisie side in what is sure to be the first of many games under Champions League lights for Barca this year.
BetMGM selection: Gordon to score or assist @ 1/2
Napoli vs Arsenal
Massimiliano Allegri's rebuild at Napoli has been far from smooth.
Back-to-back defeats in Italy – including a collapse from 2-0 up to lose 3-2 at Inter – and Alessandro Buongiorno, Scott McTominay and Kevin De Bruyne all sidelined put them in a precarious position given who they face first.
This will be the first Champions League game Arsenal have played since losing the final to PSG on penalties, and they've already started the season in imperious form.
Mikel Arteta's side went unbeaten in normal time throughout the whole league phase in 2025/26, conceding fewer goals than anyone else in the competition, and have picked up right where they left off this term.
A trip to the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona is rarely straightforward but the way the Premier League champions are playing at the moment very much is.
Against Inter at the San Siro in last season's league phase, the north Londoners didn't just beat the best team in Italy 3-1 – they outclassed them in xG, shots on target and big chances too.
We're confident Arsenal pick up where they left off and begin their Champions League campaign in the same dominant fashion, which is why a -1 handicap at 21/10 also has its appeal.
BetMGM selection: Arsenal -1 handicap @ 21/10
Liverpool vs Atletico Madrid
The more things change the more things stay the same, especially when it comes to Liverpool vs Atletico Madrid at Anfield.
It's a repeat of last season's opening league-phase fixture, a seesaw of a game that ended 3-2 with Virgil van Dijk popping up in the 92nd minute to settle it after Marcos Llorente had twice dragged Atletico level.
Llorente has been at the centre of a lot of heartache for the Reds – going so far as to name his dog ‘Anfield’ because of it – scoring four goals in just two appearances on Merseyside, including an extra-time brace that knocked the then holders out in 2020.
The World Cup winner with Spain is also one half of our 9/2 double for both he and Alexander Isak to have a shot on target.
Isak’s brace against Ipswich last Friday had shades of the Isak the Reds bought from Newcastle, which only bodes well for the rest of the season both domestically and in Europe.
It’s a hell of a price given Isak’s ever-present eye for goal and Llorente’s capacity to cause the maximum amount of damage every time he steps foot in Liverpool.
BetMGM selection: Isak & Llorente 1+ SoT each @ 9/2
Manchester United vs Sabah
Sabah FK, founded in Baku in 2017, are the youngest club in Champions League history to reach the league phase.
Their reward? A group draw that pits them against Arsenal, Barcelona and, of course, Manchester United to kick off their maiden European campaign, a level of step-up that's hard to overstate for a club whose home ground holds just 13,000 people.
For a sense of what's coming, look no further than Newcastle's demolition of fellow Azerbaijani side Qarabag in last season's competition.
Eddie Howe's side were already 5-0 up at half-time in the first leg alone, en route to a 9-3 aggregate win. Qarabag, unlike Sabah, actually had genuine Champions League pedigree at the time.
There are many betting routes to take here but we like the look of Michael Carrick’s side to score two goals or more in the opening 45 minutes at EVS.
United have already been beaten by newly promoted Hull and dropped two points to Everton in the closing seconds of the game, but even they should be dispatching this side from the Azerbaijan Premier League with ease.
Surely this isn’t another Grimsby Town situation?
BetMGM selection: Over 1.5 Man Utd first-half goals @ EVS
Odds correct at time of publication but subject to change.
