Messi, Fernandes, Haaland: The Champions League Team of the Season so far

GiveMeSport

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By Danny Ryan

Published Mar 18, 2021

Lionel Messi features, but there's no place for Cristiano Ronaldo

Only eight teams remain in this season's Champions League.

After a marathon of continental entertainment over the past month or so, the 2020/21 quarter-finalists have been confirmed following Chelsea and Bayern Munich's victories on Wednesday night.

Those two teams will be joined by Borussia Dortmund, FC Porto, Paris Saint-Germain, Liverpool, Manchester City and Real Madrid in Friday's draw.

It promises to be a mouthwatering round of Champions League action and right now, it's hard to pick a team that's the clear favourite to lift ol' Big Ears in May.

Every team left in the competition possesses a plethora of quality players and the same can be said about 95% of the sides already eliminated.

That makes selecting a Champions League Team of the Season mighty difficult, as there are simply too many world-class operators to pick from.

Thankfully, the stats boffins over at WhoScored have done the dirty work for us, providing the competition's best XI of the 2020/21 campaign so far using their various algorithms.

Given that their team features players who have exited the competition, there are more than a few surprising inclusions, with Cristiano Ronaldo one of many notable absentees.

Let's take a look...

The Champions League Team of the Season so far

Despite being eliminated from the Champions League at the group stage with Manchester United, Bruno Fernandes makes the cut in central midfield ahead of the likes of Kevin De Bruyne, Luka Modric and Toni Kroos.

Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester City's don't have a single player in the XI, which just doesn't seem right given how the three teams performed in their last-16 ties.

How Joao Cancelo and Ruben Dias have missed out in favour of Juan Cuadrado and Cristian Romero is beyond us, but that's just the way it is from a strictly statistical perspective.

Lionel Messi is currently the highest-rated player overall, although Erling Haaland is tantalisingly close to the Barcelona star's muscular 8.5 rating thanks to his stunning performances over two legs for Borussia Dortmund against Sevilla.