Towards the end of each year, we ask all editors across our 14 newsrooms to vote on the year's Flashscore Awards – these are awards that celebrate football's best and brightest. This year we had more than 50 votes in each category.
The “Match of the Year 2024” award, with 25.5% of the votes, went to Real Madrid-Manchester City, final 3-3 at Santiago Bernabeu in the first leg of the Champions League quarter-finals.
A goal in the derby in the Champions League
Already known as “the Champions League derby”, the match on 9 April lived up to expectations and offered a real spectacle to millions of football fans.
Let's remember the key moments at the end of the 90 minutes: Pep Guardiola's “citizens” opened the scoring with the first shot on goal already in the second minute, when Bernardo Silva “deceived” Andriy Lunin with a shot from a free kick.
Despite a perfect start to the match, with Haaland and Grealish having great chances to extend England's lead, City found themselves level in the 12th minute when Eduardo Camavinga's shot beat Ederson with the help of a deflection by Ruben Dias.
Not even two minutes later, the Brazilian Rodrygo was the protagonist of an extraordinary action: the Brazilian striker gave Madrid the lead by beating Ortega with a classy finish.
After the break, City, who looked in dream form compared to the moment, managed to turn the result around in just 5 minutes. Phil Foden (66) and Josko Gvardiol (71) stood out, both authors of splendid shots from outside the area.
It looked like City were on the verge of winning the match, but a splendid angled volley from Valverde, who beat Ortega after a cross from Vinicius from the left flank, ruined the Citizens' calculations to set the final result of a match at 3-3 to remember.
In the return leg a week later, Madrid won on penalties after 90 minutes, while the scoreboard still showed a 1-1 draw after goals from Rodrygo (12) and Kevin De Bruyne (76).
The last edition of the Champions League was won, in the end, by Real Madrid, who defeated the Germans Borussia Dortmund 2-0 in the final at Wembley.
It was also the last Champions League to be played with a group system: this season, in fact, UEFA opted for a substantial change to the prestigious European competition, transforming it into a sort of single-group championship.
Real and City, yesterday and today
In the main group of this season's Champions League, it is important to note that both Real and City have not yet guaranteed a place in the round of 16, although many fans would have expected their favorite teams to easily occupy a top 8 position .
Let's remember that last season Carlo Ancelotti's Real won trophies such as the Champions League, the Spanish title, the Spanish Super Cup and the European Super Cup.
Manchester City, under the leadership of Pep Guardiola, triumphed at the Club World Cup and won the Premier League title for the fourth time in a row. If we go back even further, to a year and a half ago, the Citizens had achieved the historic treble: Champions League, Premier League e FA Cup.
With two rounds to go in this first phase, City are in 22nd place with just 8 points from 6 games, while Real are two places higher with 9 points.
At the beginning of 2025, the Citizens will not have two easy matches in the final stages: City will play, first, away against PSG – the Parisians are also going through a bad period – and, in the last round, Pep's troops will welcome Belgian club Brugge at the Etihad.
Carlo Ancelotti and Real will instead welcome Salzburg to the Bernabeu before traveling to France, to Brest, a difficult team to beat in Europe this season.
Look at the standings of the main phase of the Champions League
