Looking to win their 100th match in European competitions, Galatasaray will play Germany's Schalke 04 in the UEFA Champions League today. The match will kick off at 10 p.m. (1900 GMT) at Istanbul's Türk Telekom Stadium. So far, the Lions have played 273 matches in UEFA competitions, winning 99 games and losing 103. To date, the UEFA Champions League Cup has proved elusive for Turkish clubs, with Galatasaray being the only Turkish club to have won the UEFA Cup in 1999-2000 and the 2000 UEFA Super Cup. Galatasaray's other rivals in Group D, Porto and Lokomotiv Moscow will meet in the Russian capital today. Porto has four points after beating Galatasaray, who is third in Group D with three points. Schalke also has four points after sealing the late win against Lokomotiv in their last match. The German team has drawn all three UEFA games in Turkey, so far.
On another note, Galatasaray's Uruguayan goalkeeper Fernando Muslera can equal the team record for most appearances in Champions League matches. The Lions' former Colombian goalkeeper Faryd Mondragon and Romanian player Gheorghe Popescu had the record with 30 appearances in the Champions League. Galatasaray has not been able to win their last seven matches against German teams. Fernando, Sofiane Feghouli, Henry Onyekuru and Emre Akbaba will not be able to play due to injuries. Schalke defender Naldo will also miss today's Champions League match because of illness. Schalke said Tuesday that Naldo and captain Ralf Faehrmann, who is nursing a groin problem, would stay home.
Elsewhere in the Champions League, Tottenham Hotspur travels to the Netherlands with a very simple equation: Win or bust. Defeats to Barcelona and Inter Milan have left Tottenham alongside PSV Eindhoven at the bottom of Group B, each yet to earn a point.
With a home tie against the Dutch club to follow in a fortnight, two wins against PSV would restore Tottenham's hopes of advancing, especially as Barcelona and Inter are set to take points off each other. But anything other than a win in Holland today would leave Spurs facing a massive uphill battle to make the last 16. Lionel Messi's absence leaves Barca vulnerable when they need him most.
Borussia Dortmund takes an unbeaten season record into today's Champions League date with Atletico Madrid, which is seen as their first big test of the campaign. Victory against Atletico would ease fears of a possible repeat, and the mere fact that they are in the same group will make some dream big. The two sides met for the first time in the quarterfinals of the 1965-66 Cup Winners' Cup, and again in the group stage of the 1996-97 Champions League. Dortmund went on to win the trophy on both occasions.
Paris Saint-Germain will host Italian rival, Napoli. The French team beat Red Star Belgrade 6-1 last time out. Meanwhile, Red Star Belgrade, embroiled in a Champions League match-fixing scandal, has erected a wall of silence around the Rajko Mitic Stadium ahead of their clash with Liverpool today. The trip to Anfield should have been a celebration for the team, 27 years after they won the European Cup, the first and last triumph in the competition for a club from the former Yugoslavia. The match, however, has been overshadowed by suspicion following the announcement that French investigators are probing allegations of match-fixing in the club's 6-1 thrashing by Paris Saint-Germain in their last Champions League group-stage outing on Oct. 3.
