Champions League: Bayern Munich humbled by Villarreal

Villarreal squandered numerous opportunities to take a huge advantage into the second leg of their UEFA Champions League quarter-final clash against Bayern Munich. Instead, they were only able to manage a 1-0 victory in the first leg of the tie on Wednesday night, but it was a humbling experience for the German giants nonetheless.

The match was completely dominated by the home side to the delight of the crowd at the Estadio de la Ceramica. Bayern Munich were the favourites, but Unai Emery was able to light a fire under his players to push them to create a memorable evening in Europe's biggest club competition.

It took only eight minutes for Villarreal to take the lead thanks to fantastic team play between Dani Parejo, Giovani Lo Celso and Gerard Moreno, who all set-up Arnaut Danjuma for the goal.

Bayern looked positively stunned, but their players could not even manage to wrestle the ball away from Villarreal long enough to give Thomas Mueller or prolific forward Robert Lewandowski a real opportunity to create a threat on the other side of the pitch. Kingsley Coman and Serge Gnabry were simply no match for Pervis Estupinan or Juan Foyth all evening.

It was quite unusual to see Bayern Munich looking bewildered on a Champions League night, and things only got worse after Villarreal scored another goal that was disallowed to the relief of the visitors.

Gerard will be kicking himself for missing several chances to extend the lead, including a shot that hit the post and a failed opportunity to punish Manuel Neuer for a mistake.

In the end, the Spanish side only managed a narrow lead after the first leg, but the Bavarians looked bruised and battered after the match. They are lucky to escape with still a huge opportunity to turn things around at the Allianz Arena next week.