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Greetings to a fresh evening of exciting European Cup soccer. 9 games are set for tonight, with 3 English clubs in action. Chelsea take on Barcelona in the standout fixture of the night, whilst The Magpies visit the French side and City host Leverkusen.

Current Standings

It's the midway stage of the group phase, so the rankings is starting to take shape. All six British clubs are currently in the top 12, but there are only two points between 5th and sixteenth position, thus there's a whiff of snakes and ladders about the entire situation. It’s all up for grabs.

Match Schedule

Here are this evening's fixtures, each starting at 8pm except where noted:

• Benfica lead Ajax 1-0 (5.45pm)
• Union SG and Galatasaray level at 0-0 (17:45)
• Juventus face Bodo/Glimt
• Chelsea v Barcelona
• Dortmund v Villarreal
• Man City v Leverkusen
• Newcastle travel to Marseille
• Napoli v Qarabag
• Slavia Prague v Athletic Bilbao

Team News

Fofana, Moises Caicedo, Alejandro Garnacho, Malo Gusto and Estevao all come into the Chelsea side. Dropped are Tosin Adarabioyo, Santos, Gittens, Joao Pedro and Delap.

Yamal starts for Barcelona; Rashford is among the substitutes.

The Blues (possible four-three-three) Robert Sanchez; Reece James, Wesley Fofana, Chalobah, Marc Cucurella; Malo Gusto, Caicedo, Enzo Fernandez; Estevao, Neto, Garnacho.

Subs: Kjell Scherpen, Tosin Adarabioyo, Benoit Badiashile, Delap, Bynoe-Gittens, Santos, Pedro, Jorrel Hato, George, Joshua Acheampong, Marc Guiu, Buonanotte.

Barcelona (possible four-two-three-one): Garcia; Jules Kounde, Ronald Araujo, Pau Cubarsi, Alejandro Balde; Eric Garcia, De Jong; Yamal, Fermin Lopez, Torres; Lewandowski.

Substitutes: Szczesny, Kochen, Raphinha, Marcus Rashford, Andreas Christensen, Casado, Gerard, Olmo, Noah Darvich, Dro Fernandez, Roony Bardghji.

Official Slavko Vincic (Slovenian).

Past Meetings

The sole past encounter involving Marseille and Newcastle was the Uefa Cup semi-final of 2003-04, claimed by an rising star from Ivory Coast. Manchester City and Bayer Leverkusen have never met before. Barcelona and Chelsea have some past encounters.

Early Match Updates

Only a single goal in the first half of the early fixtures. Samuel Dahl's 6th-minute sizzler has earned Benfica under Mourinho a 1-0 advantage away to the Dutch side.

Newcastle’s Trip to Marseille

Although The Magpies traveled to the south of France coming off their restorative two-one home Premier League win over City on the weekend, and having defeated Union Saint-Gilloise, the Portuguese side and Bilbao in the Champions League, their only on the road victory since the start of April came in Brussels at Union SG.

Not that Eddie Howe was eager to talk about the psychological aspect of this away form issue. “The Champions League is different to domestic games,” said the coach, whose team are sixth in the Champions League standings, with nine points from a possible twelve and direct progression to the last 16 nearly secured. “I don’t know if you can draw parallels between them.”

We have a separate live blog for Barcelona vs Chelsea. Murray, the MBM version of Diego Maradona is handling for that.