Top Winners and Losers After Wednesday's Champions League Round of 16 Leg 2 Results

What a day of Champions League football. Well, at least in one of the games. 

Real Madrid overcame a two-goal deficit in aggregate—all in the second half on Wednesday's matchup—to beat Paris Saint-Germain 3-1 (3-2 aggregate) in round of 16 action. 

And in the other game—yes, there was a second game—Manchester City and Sporting played to a goalless draw. Not much drama there; City came into the match with a 5-0 edge in aggregate. 

But Real Madrid's second-half comeback was the stuff of legend. And the day's winners and losers all hail from that match. 

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Winner: Karim Benzema 

Are you kidding?

Benzema may have been gifted his first goal (more on that below), but in the span of two minutes, he scored two more, and in the process shocked the continent, ended PSG's UCL campaign and further solidified himself as not only one of the finest players of his generation and in Real Madrid history, but also one of the most impactful players in Champions League history.

What's left to say? Because of Benzema, they are singing in the streets of Madrid and groaning in the homes of Paris. 

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Loser: Gianluigi Donnarumma

What exactly was Gianluigi Donnarumma thinking here?

Inexcusable. 

Donnarumma's teammates didn't do him any favors on the next two goals, but this gaffe was when the dam started to break. 

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Winner: Kylian Mbappe

A bittersweet day for Kylian Mbappe, whose brilliance was not matched by his teammates. 

He absolutely bossed long stretches of Wednesday's matchup, putting multiple shots on target and having two goals disallowed, including one that had a dummy for the ages:

But he also got his tally, his second of the tie, with yet another astonishing bit of skill: 

This man is one of the best players alive. There's plenty of blame to go around for PSG after this devastating loss, but very little of it—if any—falls on Mbappe.

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Loser: PSG's Future

If football was TikTok, PSG's latest post would have "Oh no / Oh no / Oh no, oh no, oh no" blaring in the background. 

Because this... this was a disaster. 

PSG, which turned down a small fortune to keep Mbappe this season despite the possibility of him leaving on a free after the season, could have justified almost any outcome had they finally won a Champions League title. 

But to lose in the round of 16, and to potentially lose Mbappe without getting a cent in return, is literally the worst possible outcome imaginable. If Mbappe leaves—for the club that knocked PSG out of the UCL, no less—it will be remembered as one of the worst moments in club history. 

Maybe one of the worst mistakes, from a roster-building perspective, in sports history.