Manager Pep Guardiola shared an emotional moment with goalscorer Phil Foden as Manchester City ended their run of failure in the Champions League quarter-finals, beating Borussia Dortmund 2-1 for a 4-2 aggregate win.
Jude Bellingham scored to put Dortmund on course for an upset before City hit back through a penalty by Riyad Mahrez and Foden’s strike.
Guardiola reached the semi-finals with City at the fifth attempt, matching the club’s best result under his predecessor Manuel Pellegrini in 2016. They will face Paris Saint-Germain in a block-busting semi-final.
“For the club it’s so important, we cannot deny,” Guardiola said. “Of course we want more.”
He praised PSG for knocking out “the best team in the world” - Bayern Munich - in the quarterfinals, “so we will see what will happen.”
Guardiola had said he expected to be labelled “a failure” if Dortmund became the fourth club in a row to eliminate City in a Champions League quarterfinal, after Lyon last year and before that Tottenham and Liverpool. Monaco beat City in the round of 16 in 2017 in Guardiola’s first season.
“We are incredibly happy today to reach the semifinals,” Guardiola added. ”The guys deserve it because what they have done in this season is incredible.”
Bellingham, Dortmund's 17-year-old English midfielder, put the German club ahead when he scored in the 15th minute after City defender Ruben Dias blocked Mahmoud Dahoud's shot. That levelled the aggregate score 2-2, with Dortmund ahead on away goals.
City then laid siege to the Dortmund goal, with Kevin De Bruyne hitting the crossbar. And Dortmund handed City the breakthrough early in the second half when Emre Can gave away a penalty by heading a cross on to his arm. Mahrez put City back in control when he blasted the 55th-minute spot kick into the top right, past stand-in goalkeeper Marwin Hitz.
Chasing another goal to force extra time, Dortmund pushed forward, but could only muster an off-target header from Mats Hummels at a free kick.
Foden, who also scored in the first leg last week, made sure of the win in the 75th with a low shot past Hitz from the edge of the box off a short corner routine. He ran straight to Guardiola on the touchline to celebrate with a hug.
“You have the feeling he’s a guy who never hides and, he always creates something. he is dynamic defensively, offensively," Guardiola said. “He scored two important goals, the second goal in the Etihad (in the first leg) and today and helped us to the semifinals.”
The loss means Dortmund could face an exodus of talented young players at the end of the season, with some of Europe's biggest clubs certain to be interested in striker Erling Haaland and forward Jadon Sancho.
