Virgil van Dijk scored a dramatic late winner to grab Liverpool a 3-2 Champions League victory over Atletico Madrid, while Bayern Munich thrashed Club World Cup winners Chelsea 3-1 on Wednesday night.
Pafos and Bodo/Glimt marked their Champions League debuts with hard-earned draws, while Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) kicked off their title defence by thrashing Atalanta on Wednesday.
Liverpool, with club-record signing Alexander Isak on debut, raced into a two-goal lead inside the first six minutes as Atletico struggled to get out of their own half on Merseyside.
A Mohamed Salah free-kick flew in off Andy Robertson for a fortuitous fourth-minute opener, before the Egyptian forward collected Ryan Gravenberch’s pass and slotted into the bottom corner.
Atletico eased themselves into the game and halved the deficit in first-half injury time.
Marcos Llorente, who scored twice in Atletico’s famous last-16 win at Anfield five years ago, stabbed the ball beyond a diving Alisson Becker from the edge of the box.
Liverpool missed several chances to restore their advantage, including a glaring miss from Salah when he struck the post, and Llorente made them pay with a deflected late volley to draw Diego Simeone’s men level.
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Arne Slot’s English champions have won all four of their opening Premier League games of the season with winners inside the last 10 minutes.
This time it was skipper Van Dijk who produced the big moment with an excellent header from Dominik Szoboszlai’s corner in the 92nd minute.
PSG also got their first Champions League campaign as reigning European champions off to a flying start with a 4-0 win over Atalanta in Paris.
Bayern gave themselves an early two-goal lead in a repeat of the 2012 Champions League final against Chelsea at the Allianz Arena.
Trevoh Chalobah’s own goal and a Harry Kane spot-kick put the six-time champions in control, although Cole Palmer lashed a shot into the top corner to pull one back for Chelsea just before the half-hour mark.
But Bayern ensured Chelsea’s first match in the competition since 2023 would end in defeat.
Chelsea wing-back Malo Gusto inadvertently played the ball to Kane who gleefully accepted the gift with a cool finish to effectively kill off Chelsea in the 63rd minute.
Inter Milan, who were humbled 5-0 in last season’s final by PSG, started their league-phase campaign with a 2-0 away win against Ajax.
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