Story highlights
Manchester City beaten 1-0 away to Sporting Lisbon in Europa League
Xandoa scores only goal of the first leg last 16 tie in Lisbon
Manchester United lose 3-2 at home to Athletic Bilboa
Valencia beat PSV Eindhoven 4-2
The English Premier League top two Manchester City and Manchester United suffered embarrassing defeats in their Europa League last 16 ties Thursday.
Leaders City were beaten 1-0 at Sporting Lisbon, while reigning champions United suffered the indignity of a 3-2 home defeat to Athletic Bilbao to seriously undermine their hopes of a quarterfinal berth.
United’s home form in the Champions League led to their failure to qualify from the group stages and condemned them to Europe’s second-tier club competition.
And it proved the same story again, despite taking a 22nd minute lead through Wayne Rooney.
La Liga side Bilbao were always a danger and duly underlined that threat with goals from Fernando Llorente, Oscar de Marcos and Iker Muniain to leave the Old Trafford faithful stunned.
More might have followed but for fine saves from David de Gea before Rooney reduced the deficit with an injury-time penalty to give Alex Ferguson’s men some hope for the second leg in Spain,.
But they could not force an equalizer in a frantic finish as Bilbao held on for a famous win.
“We were well beaten. Bilbao were the better side,” Ferguson told Channel 5. “Our defence wasn’t very good tonight and we were on the back foot because of it. But we can win the second leg next week because we showed that we can create chances against them.”
Earlier, City put on a lackluster performance in Lisbon against a side 14 points behind leaders Porto in their national league.
City had thrashed Porto 6-1 on aggregate in the previous round, but found Sporting more of a handful at the Jose Alvalade Stadium.
Center back Xandao showed a Brazilian’s skill to claimed the game’s only goal with an impudent back-heel in the 51st minute.
City burst into life and Sergio Aguero and Aleksandar Kolarov went close with efforts.
Substitute Mario Balotelli came closest with a header that rattled the crossbar but Joe Hart had to be alert in the visiting goal to prevent them falling further behind.
Valencia, among the favorites for the competition, beat PSV Eindhoven 4-2 with Robert Soldado scoring twice, but conceded two late goals to the Dutch side to keep the tie alive.
Another fancied side, Atletico Madrid, held a 3-0 lead inside 37 minutes of their first leg at home to Besiktas, but had to settle for a 3-1 win.
Eduardo Salvio scored twice in four minutes for the Spaniards.
