1998–99 UEFA Champions League
44th season of the UEFA club football tournament / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The 1998–99 UEFA Champions League was the 44th season of the UEFA Champions League, Europe's premier club football tournament, and the seventh since it was renamed from the "European Champion Clubs' Cup" or "European Cup". The competition was won by Manchester United, coming back from a goal down in the last two minutes of injury time to defeat Bayern Munich 2–1 in the final. Teddy Sheringham and Ole Gunnar Solskjær scored United's goals after Bayern had hit the post and the bar. They were the first English club to win Europe's premier club football tournament since 1984 and were also the first English club to reach a Champions League final since the Heysel Stadium disaster and the subsequent banning of English clubs from all UEFA competitions between 1985 and 1990. It was the first time since 1968 that Manchester United won the Champions League, giving them their second title.
Tournament details | |
---|---|
Dates | Qualifying: 22 July – 26 August 1998 Competition proper: 16 September 1998 – 26 May 1999 |
Teams | Competition proper: 24 Total: 56 |
Final positions | |
Champions | Manchester United (2nd title) |
Runners-up | Bayern Munich |
Tournament statistics | |
Matches played | 85 |
Goals scored | 238 (2.8 per match) |
Attendance | 3,549,002 (41,753 per match) |
Top scorer(s) | Andriy Shevchenko (Dynamo Kyiv) Dwight Yorke (Manchester United) 8 goals each |
← 1997–98 |
Manchester United also completed the Treble, becoming the fourth side in Europe to do so and in the process prevented Bayern Munich from achieving the feat themselves, Bayern eventually finished runners-up in their domestic cup two weeks later.
Manchester United won the trophy without losing a single match, despite having competed in a group with Bayern Munich, Barcelona and Brøndby, plus two highly rated Italian clubs in the knock-out stages. However, United became champions with just five wins in total, the lowest number of wins recorded by a champion in the Champions League era to date, though the competition now has an extra round of two matches in the knock-out stages.
It was the first time the Champions League was won by a team that had neither won their domestic league nor the Champions League the previous season and therefore would not have qualified for the tournament under the old qualification rules (title holder or national league champion). For the second time, the runners-up of eight domestic leagues entered the competition.
Real Madrid were the defending champions but were eliminated in the quarter-finals by Dynamo Kyiv.